After River Falls loss, Hodag Hoops seeded 2nd for WIAA tourney

It’s hard to know exactly what the WIAA computers would have spit out had last Saturday’s game against River Falls turned out differently for the Rhinelander High School boys’ basketball team. Regardless, the Hodags know they can play with anybody in their half sectional as the WIAA tournament begins next week.

The Hodags (20-3, 12-1 Great Northern) received the No. 2 seed in their 10-team Division 2 half sectional when the WIAA unveiled the brackets Sunday, Feb. 22. Rhinelander will play either seventh-seeded Wausau East or 10th-seeded Antigo when they open the playoffs a week from tonight at the Jim Miazga Community Gymnasium. 

It’s Rhinelander’s second straight year as the two-seed in the bracket. If they win next Friday, they would host either sixth-seeded Merrill or third-seeded Menomonie in the regional finals the following night. Rhinelander lost in the regional finals to New Richmond a season ago. 

That’s exactly where Hodag coach Derek Lemmens figured his team would end up on the eve of the bracket’s release.

“I think we’re going to be at two. I’d have to think we have a solid grasp on that too,” he said. “So we’ll see how that plays out and who we draw. But at the end of the day, I feel like we should be in a position to get two home games. So that’s what we want.” 

River Falls (16-6, 11-2 Big Rivers) ended up as the No. 1 seed in the tournament, and its hard not to wonder what would have happened had the Hodags not squandered a 14-point second half lead in a 70-69 overtime loss to the Wildcats Feb. 21 at the Miazga Gym.

River Falls finished on a 10-0 run over the final 3:34 of regulation and tied it on a Cullen Johnson 3 with just over a minute left. Devon Feck scored a career-high 32 points and hit nine 3-pointers in the contest, but it went for naught as the Hodags faded down the stretch. 

“We missed out on a really nice opportunity, but, I guess our takeaway is we’d rather feel this right now than in one or two games,” Lemmens said. “We very clearly have to work on finishing games. We started playing to not lose, and we lost our momentum. I didn’t use timeouts very well down the stretch. So, you know, those types of things we’re gonna learn from, we’re gonna move on.”

Feck missed a contested jumper at the buzzer to end regulation and Cal DuMond gave the Wildcats their first lead since the 6:45 mark of the first half on a basket 39 seconds into overtime. 

Neither team had much to speak of for offense in the extra session, but the Hodags had a chance down 68-66 with the ball and 19.9 seconds left. No one was in position to receive a Feck pass with just over eight second remaining, leading to the Hodags’ 20th turnover of the night. Brody Graetz hit two free throws on the other end with 6.6 seconds left before Feck banked in a desperation 3 with 1.8 seconds to go. Rhinelander never got the ball back after Graetz was fouled with 1.8 seconds left and intentionally missed the second free throw, allowing time to expire.

A multitude of things went wrong for the Hodags down the stretch. There were turnovers, missed layups and a series of fouls on the other end that allowed the Wildcats to crawl back into the game from the foul line. 

“It comes down really to execution on a lot of a lot of levels. We had just some weak passes. We didn’t meet passes, so very fundamental things that we can fix,” Lemmens said. “I was really frustrated with how that (officiating) aspect of the game just kind of flipped. I felt like it wasn’t consistent, but we did plenty of our on our own to worry about that. We got to play through those types of things, and we just got to get better. And again, the whole point of this game was to prepare us for what we want down the stretch here. We’re a better team and we’re a more ready team now that we played this game.”

Feck had five triples in the first half as the Hodags took a 30-26 lead to the break. He hit three more in the second half as Rhinelander went up 52-40 with 9:30 remaining. 

“I loved his patience tonight. I loved how he let the game happen,” Lemmens said. “Guys around him, we had a few guys kind of disappear offensively. They have to be more present. And when Devon’s having a game like this, we had guys that just disappear, where it’s like, this is actually opening up for you more, and they need to take advantage of that.”

The Hodags went up 58-44 on a Rowan Wiczek free throw with 6:30 remaining and there was a stoppage a short time later as Graetz had his nose bloodied away from the play. He came back and scored seven of his 15 points over the final 3:37 of regulation and overtime. 

Forward Austin Stellrecht paced River Falls with 17 points and 13 rebounds. Tanner Bottolfson and Colton Nesbitt had 11 each for the Wildcats, who shot 42% (25 of 59) from the field. 

Rhinelander was 43% (22 of 51) on the night. Gretzinger as the only Hodag to join Feck in double figures, scoring 16. Evan Shoeder had eight points and 11 rebounds. 

If the seeds hold, Rhinelander and River Falls would meet again in a sectional final Thursday, March 12 at a neutral site location to be determined. The Wildcats will get either Lakeland or Rice Lake in their opener and, with a win, would see either New Richmond or Medford in the regional final. 

Lemmens said the Hodags will be ready for the Wildcats, if there is a rematch.

“At the end of the day, it comes down to we’ve got to be able to play more physical basketball, be stronger with the basketball. We just have to be better at executing. Down the stretch, those are things that we’re gonna focus on,” he said.

Rhinelander ended the regular season Thursday at Mosinee in a game that concluded after press time for today’s edition. The Hodags had a chance to earn a share of the GNC title with a win. Visit RiverNewsOnline.com for a recap of that contest and read a full report in the Tuesday, March 3 edition of the River News. 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].