Squeaker in Shawano

SHAWANO — It’s no exaggeration to say the Rhinelander High School boys’ basketball team was fractions of an inch away from a stunning upset loss on the road Tuesday night. 

That’s how close Jackson Nordin’s putback attempt at the buzzer came to going in before falling off the iron as the Hodags survived a late rally by the Hawks in a 56-55 win. 

Though Rhinelander (10-2, 5-1 Great Northern) won, there wasn’t much celebration in the locker room afterward. The Hodags nearly squandered two 12-point leads in the second half and three turnovers in the final minute nearly allowed the Hawks (5-9, 2-6 Bay) to pull out a dramatic victory.

“I feel a little bad not being super excited, because a win on the road is a win on the road and we just have to celebrate victories,” Hodag coach Derek Lemmens said. “But the way we did it, if we accept this, we’re accepting failure down the road here. If we have big goals, big aspirations, we got to hold ourselves to higher standards than that.”

Will Verkuilen scored 17 of his team-high 19 points for Shawano in the second half, including a driving layup that made it 56-53 with 1:00 remaining. Jatyn Barkus led all scorers with 23 points, but had his pocket picked on the Rhinelander’s next trip down the floor. Though that sequence ended with a missed 3-pointer by Shawano’s Grayson Swedberg, Barkus had a pass intercepted by Tristan Lawe that turned into a transition layup that made it a one-point game with 28 seconds to play.

    Rhinelander’s Jatyn Barkus drives to the basket against Shawano’s Grayson Swedberg during the second half of a non-conference boys’ basketball game at Shawano Tuesday, Jan. 20. Barkus scored a career-high 23 points in the Hodags’ 56-55 win. (Jeremy Mayo/River News)
  

Verkuilen intercepted a back pass from Devon Feck with 17 seconds left that set up the wild last-second scramble. Swedberg, who hit five triples as part of a 17-point night, missed from the left corner with 3 seconds left. Nordin’s tap back underneath the hoop with 0.5 seconds left bounced off the iron twice before falling away and allowing the Hodags to exhale.

“We just weren’t being smart. We weren’t keeping things simple,” Lemmens said of his team’s spate of mistakes down the stretch. “You can’t throw long passes. Just throw passes, get them playing from behind, and then attack. I thought guys kind of hid instead of flashing to the ball. We work on things, we talk about things, and we have to come out and we have to execute them — even when there’s pressure situations. So, something to learn from.”

Shawano lived by the 3-ball in the contest, going 10 of 24 from distance. Five of those came in the first half, capped by a Cooper Boucher make with 8:05 left to put Shawano up 23-19. The Hawks failed to make a field goal the rest of the half and the Hodags closed on a 13-1 run to take a 32-24 lead to the break. 

Rhinelander made it 36-24 before Swedberg broke the field goal spell with a 3 with 15:36 left in the second. That was followed by triples from Verkuilen and Austin Heling that made it 36-33 with 12:53 to play. 

The Hodags regained control from there with a 15-6 run that included seven points from Barkus to take a 51-39 lead. The 23 points were a career-high for the Hodag senior.

“They pressured him a lot and he did a nice job of being under control and getting on the rim. So it was nice that he was able to do that and continue to use their pressure against them,” Lemmens said.

Shawano responded with another surge a drive by Verkuilen followed by 3s from Verkuilen and Swedberg made it 51-47 with 3:30 remaining. 

Even with the long field goal drought, the Hawks finished the night shooting just under 46% (21 of 46) from the field. Rhinelander, conversely, was 22 of 52 (42%) on the night and just 3 of 13 from deep. Abe Gretzinger scored 13 for the Hodags while Devon Feck was held to single digits for only the second time this season, scoring nine points. 

“I just felt like tonight we had no edge. I know we’ve been sick and guys are tired and we played very lethargic. I think I think part of it is guys were not feeling as well as they might have said they were — especially late in the game that showed,” Lemmens said.

The Hodags needed to regain that edge earlier than originally anticipated as a key GNC matchup at Medford scheduled for this evening was pushed to last night. That change was made Tuesday in anticipation of extreme cold today. Visit RiverNewsOnline.com for a recap of that game and read a full report in Tuesday’s River News. 

Rhinelander has back-to-back home games upcoming Monday night against Tomahawk and Tuesday night against Wausau East. 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].