Page 16 — Thursday, November 4, 2021 — The Hastings Banner
Central Montcalm bests HHS spikers in postseason opener
Valerie Slaughter
Contributing Writer
The Hastings varsity volleyball team host-
ed Central Montcalm in the first round of the
MHSAA Division 2 District Tournament
Monday and fell 3-0 to the visiting Hornets.
Central Montcalm won in three close sets
by the scores of, 25-20, 25-19, 25-22.
Hastings senior Phoebe Schantz had the
emotions of any senior playing their last
game, she noted that “we played a good
game, we just couldn’t push through to win.
We played hard and I am grateful for the four
years I’ve had playing volleyball and the
memories I’ve made.”
The Saxons pushed for a comeback late in
the third set on a serving run by Isabella
Hendershot, but could not quite pull off the win.
Hendershot led the team in aces with four
for the night. Audrey Vertalka, Phoebe
Schantz and Rachel Hewitt all had three aces
each. Abby Beemer led the Saxon team in
assists with six. Vertalka had five solo blocks
and two assists for the night.
On the other side of the District bracket,
Belding defeated Portland Monday night to
earn a spot in the district semifinals in
Hastings Nov. 3 against Ionia. Central
Montcalm was set to play Lakewood on
Wednesday night at Hastings in the district’s
other semifinal match.
The winners of Wednesday’s semifinals
will be back in Hastings tonight, Nov. 4, for
the District Final.Vikings undefeated at two quads to close regular season
Brett Bremer
Sports Editor
The Lakewood varsity volleyball team has
finally made it to November.
The Vikings, ranked third in the state in
Division 2, were set to take on Central
Montcalm in the Division 2 District
Semifinals at Hastings High School last
night, Nov. 3. Lakewood has finished as the
state runner-up in Division 2 each of the past
two seasons.
Lakewood head coach Cameron Rowland
said last week that it is something of a relief
to finally see the calendar ready to turn to
November after his girls scored victories over
Stevensville Lakeshore, Harper Creek and
Caledonia at the Fighting Scots’ quad in
Caledonia Thursday evening. He thinks his
girls are ready for the postseason.
“I worry about this quad and Saturday’s
quad because they are ready,” Rowland said.
“We’re practicing really well. They feel it is
November almost.
“Are we going to continue to do the things
that are going to help us get better? They are
doing that at practice. Since our home tourna-
ment, our practices have been unreal. They
come in and it’s like ‘okay, there is a practice
plan and we’re going to knock it out.’
Practices are scheduled for two hours and we
haven’t gone two hours in probably two
weeks because they’re just getting stuff done
faster than I thought they would.
“Then we get to work on a little bit of extra
stuff. We have really been working on some
attacking. I think Zayda [Kruger] taking that
last swing, that is kind of the epitome of what
we have been working on, turning crazy
plays into swings and staying aggressive.”
Shouts from the bench were for a “swing!”
as an out of system ball flew up on the left side
of the net in front of the Viking bench. Kruger,
in a position where many high school volley-
ball players would bump a free ball over the
net, got into position and let an attack rip that
found the floor to clinch a two-set win for the
Vikings over host Caledonia Tuesday.
Lakewood scored a 25-9, 17-25, 15-13 win
against Lakeshore to open the evening, best-
ed Harper Creek. 25-13, 25-19 and then
closed the evening with a 25-13, 25-18 win
over Caledonia.
“We kind of played like we were waiting to
play Cal [against Lakeshore], which we kind
of were, but we played well after that,”
Rowland said. “We played well against
Harper Creek and played well against Cal.
We’re starting to dig more balls. Alli [Pickard]
and Carley [Piercefield] and Zayda and Mar’
[O’Gorman], and Sky’ [Bump] and Abby
[Pickard] back there are just all over the place
digging balls and we have even had to up the
heat we’re putting on balls at practice to
make drills difficult at all for them. That has
been really nice that they’re transferring that
over and continuing to do good things becausethat is what we’re going to have to be our best
at to keep winning.”
The Scots knocked off Harper Creek 25-11,
25-14 and Stevensville Lakeshore 25-10,
25-15. Lakewood, a team ranked second in
the state in Division 2 and coming off back-
to-back state runner-up finishes, scored a
25-13, 25-18 win over the Scots in the final
match of the evening.
“I feel like we finally didn’t play down to
the level we were playing against,” Lurye said
of the first two wins. “We just stuck to the plan
and competed all the way through. It was good
to just finish a game, start to finish.”
Caledonia led the second set with
Lakewood 13-11 before the Vikings took
charge. Caledonia senior outside hitter Ella
Moorlag and freshman outside hitter Cambria
Gaier led the Scots’ offense in the early por-
tion of that second set.
Lakewood freshman setter Abby Pickard
fired a second ball deep for a kill to get her
team within a point and then the Vikings’ all-
state outside hitter, Maradith O’Gorman,
smacked three consecutive kills to move their
team in front 16-13.
O’Gorman smacked five more kills for the
Vikings as they pulled away to close out the
match.
The host Fighting Scots were 2-1 for the
day, knocking off Harper Creek 25-11, 25-
and Stevensville Lakeshore 25-10, 25-15.
The Lakewood Vikings finished off the
regular season at a quad hosted by Chelsea
Saturday, scoring wins over Haslett, Chelsea
and Parma Western.
Lakewood beat the Haslett girls by the
scores of 25-9, 25-12; the Chelsea girls 25-20,
25-14 and Parma Western 25-20, 25-13.
“We again defended very well and our
offense is starting to come together for us to be
playing our best now,” coach Rowland said.
O’Gorman led that attack with 32 kills,
while adding two aces, 21 digs and four
blocks. Skylar Bump had 12 kills and 27
assists, as well as five aces and two blocks.
Kruger chipped in nine kills, Tori Wickerink
seven, Alivia Eastman five and Kenzie Wells
and Ellie Possehn had four kills each.
Abby Pickard had 23 assists, four aces
and 15 digs for the Vikings. CarleyPiercefield added nine assists to go with five
aces and a team-high 33 digs. Alli Pickard
finished with seven aces and 16 digs.
Possehn tied O’Gorman for the team lead inblocks with four. Wickerink added three
blocks.
Abby Pickard had four aces, and Bailey
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You will taste the diff erence in every single bite.Freshman Acker leads LHS boys at D2 regional meet
Brett Bremer
Sports Editor
In his second varsity race, freshman Troy
Acker was Lakewood’s leader.
Acker raced to a 59th-place time of 19
minutes 59.8 seconds at the MHSAA
Division 2 Regional race hosted by Lansing
Catholic Central at the St. Francis Retreat
Center in DeWitt.
Acker joined the Viking varsity boys’ cross
country team for the Greater Lansing
Activities Conference Championship earlier
this month.
The Lakewood boys were 13th and the
girls 12th as a team at the regional meet
where the top three teams and top 15 individ-
uals earned spots in the Nov. 6 Division 2
Lower Peninsula Cross Country Finals at
Michigan International Speedway in
Brooklyn. The top seven runners not on those
three state qualifying teams at the regional
were also guaranteed spots in the finals.
St. Johns had the two fastest guys and put
five in the top 11 to win the team regional title
with 29 points. Ionia was second with 72 points
and East Grand Rapids third with 92 points.St. Johns junior Joey Bowman was the
individual champion in 16:52.6 and his
senior teammate Griffin Armbrustmacher
placed second in 16:57.2. Two other guys
finished the race in less than 17 minutes.
Ionia senior Josiah Magley was third in
16:57.4 and Forest Hills Eastern junior
Aiden Sullivan fourth in 16:59.8.
Fowlerville was fourth as a team with 140
points, ahead of Forest Hills Eastern 156,
Corunna 164, Williamston 180, Belding 216,
West Michigan Aviation 244, Lansing Eastern
244, Haslett 247, Owosso 334, Lakewood
367 and Portland 417.
The Lakewood boys’ number two was
junior Ryan Alford who placed 66th in
20:40.1. Lakewood’s seniors were across the
finish line next. Tyson Raffler was 74th in
21:47.7 and Clayton Dumond was 84th in
23:37.3.
The Viking team had sophomore Ethan
Cappon 87th in 24:30.0 and sophomore Emil
Myers 97th in 27:20.0.
Sadie Brearley, a junior, led the
Lakewood girls’ team with a 53rd-place
time of 24:19.8. Sophomore Claire Fortierplaced 59th in 24:58.9. Viking junior
Emma Lancaster placed 64th in 25:26.7,
junior Gabby Rosenburger 76th in 26:57.
and senior Madason Morelli 82nd in
28:54.1.
The East Grand Rapids girls were nearly as
dominant as the St. Johns boys. East Grand
Rapids won the girls’ meet with 39 points,
ahead of second-place Forest Hills Eastern’s
score of 74 points.
Williamston won a sixth-score tiebreaker
with Owosso to earn the last team state qual-
ifying spot. The top five for both teams tallied
117 points. Williamston’s Ashley Sweeny
placed 46th, about 35 seconds ahead of the
sixth runner from Owosso.
East Grand Rapids sophomore Drew
Muller was the individual champion in the
race with a time of 19:37.9. West Michigan
Aviation sophomore Emma DeVries was
second in 19:56.9 and Belding senior Julia
Finley placed third in 19:58.8.
East Grand Rapids had four runners fin-
ish in the top nine, two others who placed
15th and 16th and a seventh runner who
placed 21st.The Saxons' Madison Pettingill and Audrey Vertalka go up for the block Monday
during their district match against visiting Central Montcalm while teammate Phoebe
Schantz looks on. (Photo by Valerie Slaughter)Hastings setter Abby Beemer puts a
pass into the air during her team's
MHSAA Division 2 District opener against
visiting Central Montcalm Monday. (Photo
by Valerie Slaughter)Lakewood junior setter Skylar Bump
puts a pass up during her team's win over
the host Fighting Scots at the Caledonia
Quad Thursday evening. (Photo by Brett
Bremer)
Lakewood setter Abby Pickard turns her back to the net to pass a ball with back-up
from teammate Maradith O'Gorman on the play during their match with Caledonia
Thursday evening. (Photo by Brett Bremer)