A Tale Of
Two Players

Birmingham Groves football star Micah Heilbrun makes
his college choice, and 1995 captain Jeremy Lewin is
getting ready for an important season.

STEVE STEIN STAFF WRITER

Micah Heilbrun: Off to Ohio.

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Jeremy Lewin: Call him captain.

icah Heilbrun has been through it and he's ec- cause of one mistake," Mrs. Lewin said. "Every-
static about the outcome. For Jeremy Lewin, thing got blown out of proportion in the me-
it's just beginning.
dia and the university overreacted. No one is
Selecting a college is difficult enough for a perfect. Many more important people have
high-school senior, but when the choice also made bigger mistakes than Coach Moeller did.
involves playing football, the options and the
"You know, Coach Moeller could have
possibilities can become nearly endless.
turned what happened to him into a positive
Heilbrun, a senior who played varsity foot- statement for the kids he was trying to recruit.
ball for three years at Birmingham Groves, He could have told the kids and their parents
has decided to attend Denison College in that he wasn't proud of what happened, and
Grandville, Ohio, a Division III school located he was lucky to get a second chance."
20 miles east of Columbus.
Heilbrun believes there is more to Moeller's
Lewin is a 6-foot-3, 275-pound junior line- resignation than meets the eye.
man whose gridiron goal is to play for a ma-
"It seems a shame that three hours can ruin
jor college, so next season is a crucial one.
24 years of a man's life," Heilbrun said. "I think
He will be lifting weights all summer to bulk there were some underlying issues. Michigan
up for the college scouts.
is one of the few colleges in the country where
The 17-year-old is one of four captains of an 84 record in football is mediocre and they
the 1995 Groves squad, which will be defend- were 84 the last two seasons."
ing its Oakland Activities Association Divi-
It was this focus on winning at the major
sion W championship this fall.
college level which helped convince Heilbrun
The Groves program was thrust into the to choose a Division III school, which does not
national spotlight last week when for-
mer University of Michigan football
coach Gary Moeller and then U-M as-
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sistant coach Lloyd Carr canceled speak-
ing engagements at the annual "Meet
the Coach" night for next year's varsity,
junior varsity and freshman teams.
At the time, Moeller was on indefinite
suspension following his arrest the pre-
vious weekend at the Excalibur restau-
rant in Southfield.
Instead of a packed auditorium, the
audience at Groves consisted of the fam-
ilies of Groves players, a few graduating
seniors, three newspaper reporters and
two television cameramen.
Among the football players on the
stage was Noah Heilbrun, Micah's broth-
er, who is an eighth-grader at Berkshire
Middle School.
"It was disappointing, sure, about
what happened, but the guys didn't get
too upset about it. We kind of went with
the flow," Lewin said.
Lewin wasn't recruited by Moeller,
but he says he wouldn't have thought
any differently about the ex-Michigan
coach had Moeller not been fired. His
mother, Dee Lewin, agreed.
"A man shouldn't be condemned be- Lewin blocks an opponent.

offer athletic scholarships and does not ask
its athletes to devote an inordinate amount
of time to athletics. He was recruited by Di-
vision I and Division II colleges.
"I want to be a student-athlete, not an ath-
lete-student," said Heilburn, 18, a 6-foot, 215-
pounder who probably will play slotback in
Denison's version of the "Run 'n' Shoot" of-
fense.
Heilbrun, who has a 3.76 grade-point av-
erage at Groves, plans to major in pre-med or
pre-law in college and he wants to study over-
seas.
"Even though it's a small school, Denison
has the second-best athletic facilities in the
state behind Ohio State," Heilbrun pointed
out. 'They just built a $12 million athletic com-
plex there. It's beautiful.
`Their football program is a lot like Groves
... on the rise. They went 0-9, 3-7 and 6-4 the
last three years and they've recruited some
great players." El

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