Lady Hodags hold on to win at Mosinee, second in GNC

Seemingly in control much of the second half, the Rhinelander High School girls’ basketball team had to hang on for dear life down the stretch in a battle for second place in the GNC Tuesday night at Mosinee.

The Hodags made only one field goal over the final 10 minutes and nearly saw a 14-point lead evaporate, but held on for a 43-42 win over the Indians. 

Turnovers were an issue down the stretch for Rhinelander (10-4, 5-1 Great Northern), as it gave the ball away 23 times in the game —including on four straight possessions after a Vivian Lamers layup in transition made it 43-37 with 1:40 remaining. Kaitlyn Selle turned one of those steals into a layup with 59 seconds left and then Taelyn Jirschele hit a pull-up 3 after Mosinee (10-4, 4-2 Great Northern) came away with another loose ball to make it 43-42 with 51 seconds to play. 

Mosinee then intercepted a pass with 27 seconds remaining and had three looks at the go-ahead basket, but an Indian team that shot just 23.2% (16 of 69) from the field on the night, was unable to finish. 

“I remember looking up at the clock and there were like 13 seconds left and I’m like, ‘Holy cow. They can win this now.’ I was just praying for some loose, long rebound that we could get, just to clear it,” Hodag coach Ryan Clark said. 

Clark and the Hodags had their prayers answered as Selle missed an eight-foot hook shot and Lamers secured the rebound with 8.0 seconds left. Rhinelander was able to get the inbound play across half court and Mosinee was unable to get a foul until 0.6 seconds remaining. Though Tori Riopel missed the one-and-one free throw, she tracked down her own miss to run out the clock.

“That would have been a really tough one to swallow if we let that one evaporate and lose ... That’s probably our best win of the year, for sure,” coach Clark said. “It got dangerously close. They exposed our limitations with the ball and our offense’s ability to handle the ball. We’re a little limited there. Something to work on. We can watch that on film and try to correct it a little bit.” 

Early 3s and strong defense proved to be the winning formula for Rhinelander, despite all of the turnovers and shooting just under 33% (16 of 49) from the field overall.

Lily Treder scored a game-high 17 points, including four first-half 3s that helped Rhinelander take a 29-19 lead to halftime. Treder opened the second with another 3 and the Hodags eventually went up 41-27 with 10:25 to play before things got interesting. 

Mosinee held Rhinelander’s leading scorer Aubryn Clark to eight points and made a concerted effort to take the ball out of her hands, especially in the second half.

“They’d put (Britt) Fitzgerald on Aubryn and then they’d bring Jirschele over as soon as she got across half court. So it was a double team and we just didn’t do a good job on that double team,” coach Clark explained. “We didn’t flash to the ball. We should have been able to flash the ball to the middle and hit weak side. We kind of just drifted and had a lot of times were we didn’t run through the ball and they picked it off for a live ball turnover layup.”

Even then, Rhinelander held a comfortable lead until Mosinee finally starting making some shots from the outside. Selle buried back-to-back 3s that cut the lead 41-34 with 5:17 to play and then Daisy Spink knocked down a triple that made it a four-point game with 4:48 to go. 

Rhinelander’s defense forced Mosinee into tough shots much of the night. Jirschele, who came in averaging more than 20 points per game, was held to 10 on 4 of 21 shooting. Selle finished one rebound shy of a double-double with 11 points and nine rebounds, but even she was just 4 of 12 from the field. Mosinee also struggled from the foul line, going 5 of 15 on the night.

“Vivian on Jirschele, holding her to 10 points, was really key,” coach Clark said. “The key of the game was we kept going back and battling on defense. It was next-play mentality and we really fought hard. Even when they scored, I thought they had to earn it.”

Jamison finished with nine points in the contest for Rhinelander, which moved into sole possession of second in the GNC, just one game behind Lakeland, at the halfway point of the conference season. 

“I think Lakeland’s clearly the best team in the conference but, going in, I thought we could be anywhere from 2 to 4,” coach Clark said. We’ve won at Mosinee. We’ve won at Medford. That’s pretty awesome, two tough places to play.

The Hodags host Medford tonight to begin the second half of the conference slate. The Hodags downed Medford 44-29 at Raider Hall back on Nov. 28.

“Last time they box-and-oned Aubryn, face guarded her, but Lily played well and was attacking. I always love the second round in the conference,” coach Clark said. “You get to see which teams are improving at a rapid rate. Then you get to make adjustments. They’re going to make some adjustments. We’ll make some more, too. I anticipate that will be a really good game.” 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].