After sluggish start, Hodag Hoops fends off Northland Pines

Shots were not falling during the first half for the Rhinelander High School boys’ basketball team Friday night against Northland Pines. Luckily for the Hodags, they weren’t falling for the Eagles, either. 

Rhinelander overcame a 22% shooting performance in the first half and edged away to a 59-47 victory over the Eagles at the Jim Miazga Community Gymnasium.

Will Gretzinger led all scorers with 21 points for Rhinelander (3-1, 2-0 Great Northern) and Truman Lamers chipped in 10, but the contest left plenty to be desired for Hodag coach Derek Lemmens. 

“We won tonight. It was a conference win, but it left me with a sour taste in my mouth because of the way that we played,” he said. “It’s wasn’t good.”

Neither team could find the basket early in the game as Rhinelander led 4-2 halfway through the first. The Hodags eventually inched away to a 19-14 lead at the break, but Lemmens said many of his team’s struggles came when it started playing outside the framework of the offense. 

“It was frustrating because we’re talking about moving the basketball, getting rhythm shots and we’re really emphasizing things,” he said. “We’re doing it and when we do it, it looks beautiful and it’s successful. Then we get into game mode and it’s all for us. It was selfish offense in a lot of ways tonight.”

Defense, especially in the first half, remained a bright spot for the team. The Hodags held Pines to 6 of 21 shooting from the field in the first half and forced nine turnovers. Even then, as the scoring picked up in the second half, so did the fouls as Pines took advantage of some overly aggressive play on Rhinelander’s part.

“This team is playing really hard, there’s no doubt about it,” Lemmens said. “They are playing really hard. That’s a young Pines team. I really liked what we did defensively. We play hard and we play together, but we’re just not playing smart. 

“Once we started getting a few turnovers, then that’s what we were searching for. Instead of just understanding we were getting the turnovers because we were playing excellent position defense, now we’re reaching, now we’re trying to get steals every time, we’re fouling and accumulating all these fouls. We can’t get out of our own way sometimes.”

    Rhinelander’s Evan Shoeder puts up a shot between Northland Pines Jonathan Miller (10) and Cody Vojta (12) during the first half of a GNC boys’ basketball game against Northland Pines Friday, Dec. 8. (Bob Mainhardt for the River News)
  

The Hodags used a 15-2 run early in the second half to finally get some breathing room. Gretzinger had seven points during that stretch, including a transition layup and a pair of free throws that gave Rhinelander a 36-21 edge with 13:08 remaining. The lead stabilized from there, however. Pines got the lead back down to 39-29 with 10:10 to play before Rhinelander answered with an 11-5 spurt to push it to 16. The lead hovered between the 12- and 17-point range the rest of the way.

“It was like Crandon, when we had the opportunity to deliver the final blow, we’d just go off-script,” Lemmens said. “It just feels that we don’t want to do what’s working. I don’t know if we just don’t like playing that way or what, but things were working, the game was simple and we go and we muddy it up on our own. We get fancy, we get flashy, we lose focus.”

Devon Feck added eight points for Rhinelander, which finished the night 33% from the field on 17 of 51 shooting. Jonathan Miller, Aiden Minx and Milo Albrecht all finished with 10 for Northland Pines, which finished the night 36% on 15 of 42 shooting.

While the Hodags have won three of their first four games, Lemmens said there’s plenty to reflect upon before the Hodags hit the heart of the schedule after the start of the new year. 

“I’m hoping this was just a good learning experience for us and we really truly reflect on it and say we’ve got to be a smarter team,” he said. “We’ve got to be smarter players … These are smart guys that know how to play. We’re just not doing it.”

The Hodags traveled to Wittenberg-Birnamwood for a non-conference contest Monday night that concluded after press time for this edition. Rhinelander hops back into GNC play this Friday night at Tomahawk.

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].