MARQUETTE — Marquette protected its home turf perfectly at a pair of high school downhill skiing meets held at Marquette Mountain during the past two weeks.

Both Redmen and Redettes swept to titles at the Marquette Invitational on Jan. 4 and Marquette conference meet held Thursday.

The MSHS boys had the biggest challenge on Jan. 4, when they defeated Traverse City Central by just 5 1/2 points.

Because of superior finishes in the slalom, the Redmen scored 56 points to 61 1/2 for TC Central. Petoskey was third with 91 1/2.

The Redettes had a bit of an easier time against a field of Upper Peninsula and downstate teams, scoring 53 points, a 32-point victory over runner-up Petoskey, which had 85. The Great Northern team based out of Traverse City St. Francis was third with 92, while Traverse City West took fourth with 110.

In the U.P. conference meet held Thursday, the Marquette girls posted a perfect scored of 20, sweeping the top four scoring places in both slalom and giant slalom. Houghton, the only other scoring team, had 59.

The MSHS boys weren’t far off perfection, scoring 28 by taking second through fifth place in both disciplines. Houghton had 81, Ironwood 94 and Norway 99.

The Redettes’ Jacey Johnson won three of the four races between the two meets, including a sweep at the Marquette Invite.

On Jan. 4, Johnson won GS with runs of 29.43 and 30.34 seconds for a 59.77-second total, then took slalom with runs of 42.27 and 42.43 for a total time of 1 minute, 24.70 seconds.

Teammate Ainsley Kirk was second in the Marquette Invite girls GS in 1:00.14, just 37 hundredths of a second behind Johnson, then posted 33rd in slalom with 1:55.71.

MSHS skier Natalie Robinia was third in slalom at the Marquette Invite in 1:29.05, taking ninth in GS in 1:02.67.

Teammate Ella Jones was seventh in slalom on Jan. 4 with 1:32.77 and 14th in GS with 1:04.04, while Zoey Brian was 21st in slalom in 1:42.46 and 24th in GS in 1:06.14.

In addition, MSHS’ Jenna Miller was 25th in slalom in 1:47.08 and 26th in GS in 1:06.88, while Haley Thams was 26th in slalom in 1:47.69 and 31st in GS in 1:08.28.

Other finishers for Marquette included Madalyn Stern, Amara Jensen, Lea Thomson, Claire Markey and Tristin Larson.

In the boys meet of the Marquette Invite, the Redmen’s Aaron Grzelak won slalom with runs of 40.19 and 39.13 seconds for a 1:19.32 total, adding a runner-up finish in the GS with runs of 28.97 and 29.53 for 58.50 in all.

Teammate Hayden Kauppila was third in both events with 1:21.95 in slalom and 59.31 in GS.

Similarly, Marquette’s Logan Audette was eighth in each event, totaling 1:26.61 in slalom and 1:01.80 in GS.

Next for the Redmen was Keaton Jones, 13th in slalom in 1:29.33 and 15th in GS in 1:03.08, then Drake Scheidt, 16th in each discipline with 1:29.76 in slalom and 1:03.32 in GS.

Teammate Mathew Marra was 23rd in GS in 1:05.61 and 28th in slalom in 1:44.87, while Thomas Truckey was 25th in slalom in 1:07.06 and 27th in GS in 1:43.25.

Other Redmen finishers were Tucker Close and Anthony Miller.

At the conference meet for the girls, Kirk won slalom with runs of 40.65 and 40.90 seconds for a 1:21.55 total while finishing as runner-up in GS in 1:02.33.

Johnson switched spots in those events, winning GS with runs of 31.24 and 30.74 for a 1:01.98 total, then placing second in slalom in 1:24.65.

Brian was third in GS in 1:05.98 and fourth in slalom in 1:32.77, while Jones was third in slalom in 1:31.22 and sixth in GS in 1:06.41, and Stern fourth in GS in 1:06.04 and fifth in slalom in 1:33.44.

In addition, Thomson was 11th and teammate Lauren Chesla 13th in GS.

In the boys conference meet, Houghton’s Reed Heathman won both events, taking slalom in 1:18.03 and GS in 1:02.04.

Marquette’s Truman Durand was less than a second behind in slalom with runs of 39.63 and 39.15 seconds for a 1:18.78 total. He was also third in GS in 1:02.95.

Audette switched spots for the disciplines, finishing runner-up in GS with runs of 31.11 and 31.48 for a 1:02.59 total, then placing third in slalom in 1:19.53.

Scheidt was fourth in each, timing 1:21.76 in slalom and 1:04.62 in GS, while Marra was fifth in GS in 1:05.41 and eighth in slalom in 1:31.15.

The Redmen’s Jack Franchino was fifth in slalom in 1:23.62, while Tucker Close was ninth in slalom in 1:31.20 and 10th in GS in 1:08.95.

Next up for Marquette is the Houghton Meet to be held at Mont Ripley in Ripley on Jan. 22.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.

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