Students in the Documentary Filmmaking class premiered two Hillsdale College sports documentaries April 15 in Plaster Auditorium.
Lecturer in Journalism Buddy Moorehouse said this semester’s class capitalized on the stories of Hillsdale athletics.
“Sports are such a great subject for documentaries, because there’s so much built-in drama in every season, every athlete’s career, every game,” Moorehouse said. “Because Hillsdale has such a rich history in athletics, it seemed like a natural thing that we should do.”
“The Legend of Jack Gohlke” told the story of former Charger guard Jack Gohlke’s rise to fame playing with Oakland University in the 2024 March Madness tournament.
Gohlke, a 2023 graduate, had one year of eligibility left due to COVID-19 and transferred to Oakland University. In the team’s March Madness run, he helped the No. 14 seed Golden Grizzlies defeat No. 3 seed Kentucky with 10 three-pointers and a total of 32 points. Gohlke now plays for the Mexico City Angels.
Junior Carolyn Spangler, an associate director for “The Legend of Jack Gohlke,” said she enjoyed researching for the film, which included searching Hillsdale athletic department archives for information and video footage.
“I knew almost nothing about collegiate basketball at the start of the semester, so while I was researching Jack’s time at Hillsdale, it was amazing to discover the deep friendships, great sense of team, and true brotherhood which lie at the heart of the Charger basketball team,” Spangler said.
This semester’s premiere was unique with two feature-length documentaries, rather than showing individual students’ shorter projects, as previous classes have done. Moorehouse said both documentaries were timely and he wanted to produce them this year.
“I wanted to beat ESPN to the punch,” Moorehouse said. “I know they’ll probably do a Jack Gohlke documentary at some point because he was such a phenomenon.”
Moorehouse said Gohlke was scheduled to attend the premiere but his team’s schedule didn’t allow him to be there. Because of his absence, Gohlke recorded a video thanking the students for making the film and the audience for coming to watch, Moorehouse and Spangler said.
The story of Hillsdale’s 1985 football team, the school’s only national championship title winner, came to life in “The Year of the Charger.”
This year marks the 40th anniversary of the 1985 championship, which Moorehouse said was a motivation to make the film this year. Six members of the 1985 team attended the premiere.
Moorehouse said through the players’ voices, the documentary introduces the audience to head coach Dick Lowry and the impact he made on the players’ lives.
“Even though Dick Lowry passed away last year, the audience kind of came away with a real good sense of who he was, and it’s because they did an excellent job in the documentary of bringing that out,” Moorehouse said.
Senior Carly Moran interviewed players on the team for the documentary and said she enjoyed hearing their stories.
“The production process teaches you how, even when you ask the same questions about the same experience to different people, they will all have such varied perspectives,” Moran said. “Yet, all the players had a shared love for the game and one another, and all emphasized how their coach Dick Lowry had a permanent impact on their lives.”
Moorehouse said he appreciated the students’ ability to draw personal stories from the sporting events while they learned the mechanics of making a documentary.
“What they really got out of it is that even a sports documentary isn’t about sports, it’s about people,” Moorehouse said. “I think that really came through.”
