This Week

Insight

am i k:afiga

The Next Level

From the Jewish News pages 10, 20,
30, 40 and 50 years ago.

West Bloomfield's Erin Konheim has a date with Michigan State.

MIKE ROSENBAUM
Special to the Jewish News

got to not only meet Jewish
girls who play soccer around
Michigan, but around the
country. So it was a good
experience."
Coach Hicklin says
Konheim is "technically a
very good player. She's really
good going forward, taking
players on and finishing. She's
also a strong leader. A lot of
the girls looked up to her."
Although she's generally
played midfield elsewhere,
Konheim is a forward at West
Bloomfield High, which
allows her to amass impres-
sive offensive numbers. She
had 25 goals and eight assists
in her freshman year, 24 goals
and 12 assists as a sopho-
more. She missed most of last
year when she traveled to
Europe with her ODP team.
She verbally committed to
MSU in 2000 and signed a
national letter of intent this
week. She chose the Spartans
because of her relationships

T

he life of a college student-ath-
lete may appear glamorous, but
it isn't easy trying to balance
sports with schoolwork. This
will be true for Erin Konheim, 17, who'll
attend Michigan State University next fall
on a full soccer scholarship. But at least
she'll be able to focus on just one soccer
team.
Just look at her schedule this spring:
First, she'll travel to Dallas with her
Olympic Development Program (ODP)
team for a national competition. Then
she'll return home for her senior season at
West Bloomfield High School.
Her club team, Vardar, will play in
regional competition in the summer,
before she goes to East Lansing to begin
her college career.
Konheim began playing at age "5 or 6,"
she says, and she's practically never
stopped. She played in house leagues until
sixth grade, when she joined the
Erin Konheim
Birmingham Blazers club team: She
moved to the Michigan Hawks for the
next five years, culminating in a state
championship in 2000. Then she switched to Vardar, and
led that club to the state title in 2001, beating her former
Hawks team in the final, where she earned the Most
Valuable Player title even though she didn't score in
Vardar's 2-1 victory
"The whole team played well," says Vardar coach Dave
Hicklin. "Erin always works very hard, which is always a
good thing for a midfielder." In the final, "she got forward
and she also defended very well."
Konheim has rarely competed in other sports, but did
run track at West Bloomfield's Abbott Middle School,
where she won the Oakland County middle school 400-
meter championship in eighth grade.

Soccer Traveler

Soccer, Konheim says, has "definitely given me a tremendous
experience all around. I've learned so many things from it.
I've traveled around the world. I went to Europe last spring
with the ODP regional team. I've met so many new peo-
ple. And it's great competition. I'm competitive myself. I
think it's awesome to be very involved with sports."
Part of her sporting education occurred in JCC Maccabi
competitions held in Pittsburgh and Detroit in 1997 and 1998.
"I thought the experience was really good," she says. "I

Remember
When

with their coaches and players.
MSU assistant Tammy Farnum coached Konheim's
Olympic Development squad.
"I had been coached by Tammy previously and I got
along with her great," Konheim explains. "The head coach,
Tom Saxton, I've met him and he was just so nice.

Knows Teammates

"I am very comfortable with most of the players. A lot of
them have played on the Michigan Hawks, so I played
with a good majority of them before. I really didn't want to
go somewhere where I didn't know any of the players.
"So I can come in, and they know me and they know
how I play," Konheim says.
Konheim was recruited by most of the Big 10 schools,
plus West Virginia, Miami (Florida), Tennessee and Boston
University.
"My goal is to start and play a lot" as a freshman. "I'll prob-
ably end up playing outside midfielder, maybe some forward."
Coach Hicklin believes Konheim will "do very well" at
MSU. "She's already playing at the next level. I just think
it's where she should play, Division I college."
Konheim plans to major in education, with a goal of
becoming a college soccer coach.

❑

01z%
INFO
-44 4
Vt-'7gat .
Jewish Federation officials
announce that they sold the Fred
Butzel Building in downtown
Detroit to the Waycor
Development Co. The Butzel
Building, at 163 Madison, was
home to the Jewish Federation of
Metropolitan Detroit for 40 years.
The Federal Foreign Office of
Germany pledges $2.5 million for
the addition to the Holocaust
Memorial Center in West
Bloomfield, the Institute of the
Righteous.

.17

The Heart of Gold awards of the
United Foundation were presented
to Leonard Simons and Rose
Greenberg, who were among nine
local honorees.
The Bais Chabad Torah Center
opens on West Maple Road in West
Bloomfield.

David Pollack assumes the chair-
manship of the Detroit Israel Bond
Organization.

The Hannah Schloss Old Timers
honor Nathaniel Goldstick at their
seventh annual meeting for his
untiring efforts on behalf of the
welfare and needs of youth in the
city of Detroit.
Observance of the 60th anniver-
sary of the Fresh Air Society was
marked in an address at the 36th
annual meeting of the Jewish
Welfare Federation of Detroit by
Edith Heavenrich, the oldest living
past president of the society.

Henry Wineman was selected as
the honorary chairman of Detroit's
Allied Jewish Campaign. Michigan
Supreme Court Justice Henry M.
Butzel, Israel Davidson and Judge
Theodore Levin were selected as
honorary vice-chairmen.

— Compiled by Holly Teasdle,
certified archivist, the Rabbi Leo M.
Franklin Archives of Temple Beth El

2/8

2002

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