50 | AUGUST 17 • 2023 

J

im Berk kept an impres-
sive streak going at the 
2023 National Senior 
Games.
The 68-year-old former 
sportscaster-turned-personal 
trainer-exercise coach-compet-
itive swimmer has now swum 
in 12 events in five National 
Senior Games and finished in 
the top 10 in all of them. 

The West Bloomfield resi-
dent has won one medal and 
nine ribbons (for a third- 
through eighth-place finish) in 
the 12 events after qualifying 
for the events at the Michigan 
Senior Olympics.

Berk’s latest accomplish-
ments took place July 14-16 in 
Pittsburgh at the 2023 National 
Senior Games. He entered 
three events and won three 
ribbons.
He was eighth in the 50-yard 
breaststroke in :38.15, eighth 

in the 100-yard breaststroke in 
1:26.26, and fifth in the 200-
yard breaststroke in 3:10.93.
“I’m gratified,” he said. 
“There was a tough field 
there.”
At 5-foot-4, Berk was the 
shortest of the breaststroke 
competitors in Pittsburgh, he 
said. Most of his rivals were 
several inches taller.
“So they had an advantage 
over me right off the starting 
blocks,” he said. “That’s why I 
think I did better in the 200. 
I had more time to catch and 
pass them.”
While in Pittsburgh, Berk 
and the other National Senior 
Games competitors caught 
a Pittsburgh Pirates game at 
PNC Park after marching by 
state before the game in a pro-
cession on the perimeter of the 
outfield.
“We all got a free ticket to 

the game,” he said. “It was a 
fun night.”
Berk returned to PNC Park 
for another Pirates game after 
the National Senior Games 
and ran into Joe Black, a 
Pirates radio and TV play-by-
play announcer from Roseville.
“Joe said he remembered me 
from my sportscaster days in 
Detroit, so that was nice,” Berk 
said. 
This was the second straight 
National Senior Games that 
Berk won three ribbons. Last 
year in Ft. Lauderdale, he took 
fourth in the 50 breaststroke, 
fifth in the 100 breaststroke 

quick hits

BY STEVE STEIN 

Claressa Shields won the 2023 ESPY 
Award for the Best Boxer. The Flint native 
was the first female boxer to ever win the 
award, which has been presented since 
1993.
Shields’ promoter is Orthodox Jew 
Dmitriy Salita, a former professional boxer 
whose Salita Promotions company, found-
ed in 2010, is based in Southfield.
“This is an incredible honor for a generational great,” 
Salita said about Shields’ award. 
Shields became the undisputed middleweight world 
champion in 2022 with a victory over Savannah Marshall, 
and she successfully defended her titles in June with 
a unanimous decision over Maricela Cornejo at Little 
Caesars Arena in Detroit.

Former sportscaster Jim Berk 
continues to make waves 
at the National Senior Games.

Pool Haul

STEVE STEIN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

SPORTS

Jim Berk’s ribbon collection at the 
2023 National Senior Games.

All the athletes in town 
to compete in the 2023 
National Senior Games, 
including Jim Berk, 
were honored prior to a 
Pittsburgh Pirates game 
at PNC Park.

Salita Promotions Has an ESPY 
Award Winner in its Stable

Dmitriy Salita

DMITRIY SALITA PROMOTIONS

Sasha Hartje resumed her hockey career 
as a graduate student at Long Island 
University after playing tennis for four 
years at Emory University in Atlanta.
It turned out to be a great decision on 
and off the ice for the defenseman from 
Bloomfield Hills. She played in 40 games 
for Long Island over the last two seasons, 
helping the Sharks win the New England 
Women’s Hockey Alliance championship 
last year, and she earned a masters 
degree in business administration. 
She had a perfect 4.0 grade-point 
average for the 2022-23 school year and 
was named one of NEWHA’s Student-
Athletes of the Year. She also was named 
to the NEWHA All-Academic Team for 
having at least a 3.0 GPA each semester 
during the school year.
“Although I loved my time as a 

(Division III) collegiate 
tennis player at Emory, 
LIU gave me the oppor-
tunity of a lifetime to play 
Division I college hockey,” 
Hartje said. “I couldn’t be 
more grateful.”
Elle Hartje, Sasha’s 
sister, was named captain 
of the 2023-24 Yale University women’s 
hockey team in May. An All-American 
and the Ivy League Player of the Year 
last season, the senior forward compet-
ed this month in the 2023 USA Hockey 
Women’s National Festival in Lake Placid, 
N.Y.
Sasha Hartje was named a Jewish 
News High School Athlete of the Year 
in 2017. Elle Hartje received the same 
honor in 2019.

She Made the Most Out of an 
‘Opportunity of a Lifetime’

Sasha Hartje

LONG ISLAND UNIVERSITY

