Detroit, MI
Detroit Lions success brings grieving family together
DETROIT – As the Detroit Lions celebrate another win, Ford Field will take center stage Sunday when the team hosts the Minnesota Vikings.
Monday night’s game at Levi’s Stadium against the San Francisco 49ers highlighted a showdown made in revenge paradise. The Lions defeated the Niners 40-34.
Lions’ fans chant of quarterback Jared Goff’s name rivaled the atmosphere of a home game.
An emotional coach Dan Campbell gave his players praise while admitting he couldn’t even put it into words what he saw on the field.
Campbell rattled off new records including the team’s first 14-win season with the Lions remaining undefeated on the road during the regular season.
“Which tells you at its worst – we can go anywhere and win gentleman,” he said. “That’s the bottom line.”
Wherever the team has gone, through the wins and loses so have the fans. The Lions are not just a team. The team has become embedded in the lives of its fans like Elese Stubbs and her fiancé Keith Butler.
“When the Lions are playing, we watch that together on Sundays,” she said.
Monday game felt epic and bittersweet.
Butler, 69, died of Stage 4 colon cancer Nov. 19, five days after his birthday.
The last win he watched was when the Lions annihilated the Jaguars.
“Oh, he was telling everybody, ‘They’re going to the Super Bowl.’ That’s all we would tell everybody. Anybody said, ‘Oh, they’re the same Lions” – No, they’re not,” Stubbs said.
They’re not. Now, Sundays feel different.
But the Lions remind her of a love she still holds close to her heart.
“It still feels like he’s there hollering at his TV like I’m hollering at mine,” she said.
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Detroit, MI
PWHL players bond with women’s hockey pioneers at Detroit clinic | NHL.com
Both generations on the ice Friday are intent on growing the game for today’s kids. Hartje and the Polar Bears believe an important step for women’s hockey in Michigan would be starting a Division I college team.
“I think if the PWHL establishes a team in Detroit, it will put a lot of pressure on the colleges to make sure there’s a D-I team in the state,” Hartje said. “Michigan has the second-highest number of players in the league, and it would have been a dream for us to be able to stay in the state to play.”
It’s been a problem for decades. Pierson had to turn down the offer from Boston University, because her family couldn’t afford to send her to New England for college. Hartje ended up at Yale University, and Megan Keller, who scored the gold medal winning goal for the U.S. in the 2026 Winter Olympics and plays for the PWHL’s Boston Fleet, went from suburban Detroit to Boston College.
Meanwhile, 2026 U.S. men’s Olympic team members and Michigan natives Dylan Larkin of the Red Wings and Zach Werenski of the Columbus Blue Jackets were able to stay in the state to play with the USA Hockey National Team Development Program, then based in Ann Arbor, before moving on to the University of Michigan in the same town.
“Megan’s brother played at Michigan State, and I’m sure she also would have stayed here to play for a Michigan school,” Skarupa said. “It’s imperative that Michigan gets a college program.”
Skarupa is serious about growing the game. She is working with Keller and the NHL Foundation U.S. to identify recipients for its $100,000 Empowerment Grant Program for Girls Hockey.
“Every time I go back to a city, there are new teams, new girls and new faces,” she said. “It’s a testament to growth all over the world, but it is tremendous inside the U.S.”
Detroit, MI
Retired Detroit sergeant faces new sexual assault charge involving 14-year-old victim from 2002
An additional case, this one involving a victim who was then 14 years old, has been added to the sexual assault investigation against a former Detroit Police Department sergeant.
Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy announced the latest charges on Friday against Benjamin Martin Wagner, 68, who now lives in Greenville, N.C. He had retired from the Detroit Police Department in 2017.
The victim in the additional charges was 14 years old when the assault happened in October 2002 in Detroit, Worthy said. The prosecutor alleges that Wagner approached the victim, pointed a handgun at her, ordered her away from the location and then sexually assaulted her.
In this case, he faces charges of kidnapping, two counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and two counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct. An arraignment hearing took place Friday in the 36th District Court in Detroit. A probable cause conference is scheduled for April 7.
The woman is now 37 years old.
“She has lived with what happened to her for 23 years and has now bravely decided that she wants to be a part of holding him accountable,” Worthy said.
Wagner participated in a court hearing Thursday and was remanded to jail, one week after he was charged with 15 counts of kidnapping and rape in five separate sexual assault cases. All of those incidents happened between 1999 and 2003 in the northwest side of Detroit, with the victims being young women between the ages of 15 and 23.
The court dates for the earlier list of charges are April 7 for a probable cause hearing and April 14 for a preliminary exam.
Wagner joined the Detroit Police Department in 1989 as a police officer and was eventually promoted to sergeant. He retired in 2017 and moved to North Carolina.
Detroit, MI
Metro Detroit weather forecast, March 26, 2026 — 11 p.m. Update
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