The Houghton Gremlins girls basketball team poses with the Division 2 Region 9 title in Petoskey. The team includes coaches Julie Filpus and Wayne Henry, Annika Peterson, Clea Ollanketo, Kayla Cote, Gwen Markham, Stella Wickstrom, Meghan Trewhella, Myah Campioni, Rachel Bigelow, Katie Fay, Danica Ryynanen, Danielle Williston, and Katie Gaff, and manager Annie Tuttle. (Provided photo)

GAYLORD — It wasn’t for a lack of effort Tuesday night.

The Houghton Gremlins girls basketball team struggled to make baskets early, but found their groove twice, once in the second and once in the third quarter. However, they could not sustain those grooves long enough to defeat a tall, talented Frankenmuth Eagles squad in Division 2 state quarterfinal play at the Gaylord Gym. The Eagles advanced with a 51-36 win.

“I feel like we played our hearts out, we really did,” said Stella Wickstrom, a team captain for the Gremlins. “We played our hardest. Credit to Frankenmuth, they are a really good team and I hope they go far. But yeah, things just didn’t really seem to add up for us tonight.

“We didn’t really hit our shots as well as we thought we would in the first half. But, really proud of the whole team, proud of how far we made it.”

The Gremlins, who had not lost since Feb. 20 against Hancock, could not find the basket on their first two possessions before the Eagles’ Mia McLaughlin found a way to get on the board. Trailing 4-1, senior Gwen Markham, who led the Gremlins with 13 points, got a layup off the glass to pull Houghton within one, 4-3. They took a brief lead a minute later, but the Eagles (24-2) responded with a three from Lexi Boyke, which gave them back the lead for the remainder of the contest.

Boyke finished with a game-high 18 points.

“I thought our girls were ready to play, and we just battled from start to finish,” said Gremlins coach Julie Filpus, “but, a lot of the shots that we got all season, we had time to collect ourselves. There just wasn’t a very big window to decide whether you would shoot or not tonight. Credit Frankenmuth’s defense, it was kind of a little bit different from what we’ve seen all year long. It was hard to adjust to.”

Trailing by two while still in the first quarter, two Gremlins had a tense moment on the floor when senior Meghan Trewhella and junior Danica Ryynanen ran into each other on an inbounds play. Shortly after that, the Eagles’ Clare Conzelmann hit another three to extend their lead to 10-5.

The Gremlins tried multiple three’s in an attempt to catch up quickly, but nothing fell their way and they trailed 12-5 after one. Nerves seemed to affect the team, as this group of girls had never gotten this far in their high school careers. In fact, the last time Houghton won a district title was the year these seniors were in eighth grade.

“I want to say sometimes you’re a little nervous,” Wickstrom said. “It was our first time ever making it like anywhere close to state quarterfinals. There was a lot of energy in the gym, a lot of fans from both teams. So a little bit of nerves, but I think just staying focused on the game was probably a little bit of the problem.”

Trailing 14-5 in the second quarter, Trewhella, Markham and Wickstrom, also a senior, had three looks in quick succession thanks to some strong offensive rebounding, but none of their layup attempts fell their way. Senior Annika Peterson hit a three with 5:25 left in the half from the left side, pulling Houghton within eight, 16-8.

Markham and Ryynanen both got layups less than a minute apart to get back within six, 20-14, but the Eagles answered back with a layup quickly after Ryynanen’s, and then one more at the buzzer to take a 24-14 lead into the locker room.

Trailing 28-14 1:07 into the third, the Gremlins bore down and found ways to force turnovers. From those turnovers, Trewhella made a layup, followed by Wickstrom, who also drew a foul and made the free throw to complete the three-point play. Just 1:10 later, Trewhella, who finished with 12 points, came up with the ball again, forced a defender out of the way with a quick fake and made a layup to get Houghton back within eight, 28-20.

“She (Trewhella) gets into those modes for us where she just won’t quit,” Filpus said. “In many of our wins this season, her relentlessness and perseverance have really launched us to be better.”

After the Eagles regained a 10-point advantage, Markham drove to the basket, got the layup and a foul, pulling Houghton back within seven again, 30-23. Just 48 seconds after that, Trewhella found Markham driving the lane, and she made another layup to pull the Gremlins within five, 30-25.

“Gwen had a great game,” Filpus said. “We challenged her with guarding No. 33 (Boyke). She did a heck of a job. She was just tough, and used her strength, and just kind of that senior grit to really, really make her work. 33 got a couple of lob passes in the second half, and we had to put Stella on her, but offensively, as well, I thought Gwen was always in the neighborhood, and ready to get a shot up.

“So, she picked a good day to have her best game of the year, too.”

Houghton kept the pressure on, and Markham drew a foul. She made both free throws and suddenly, the Gremlins were back within three, 30-27.

“We decided at halftime to run some different plays, see if that would work out, and it ended up working out well for us,” said Wickstrom. “(We) cut it down to three. We had really good shots. We were starting to hit things, getting steals. It just didn’t really go all the way, but it definitely got us closer, which helped with the game.”

The Gremlins had a look to cut the Eagles’ lead back to two from beyond the arc with 15 seconds left, but missed, and the Eagles’ Rosemary Brenner hit one of her own with just under two seconds left to regain an eight-point lead after three quarters, 35-27.

Trewhella pulled the Gremlins back within six, 40-34, with 3:34 left in the contest, but that was as close as they could get as the Eagles got a pair of key layups over the next minute to extend their lead. Trewhella added one more layup with 1:33 left in the game, but that was the last time Houghton scored before the final buzzer.

“They had length, they had athleticism, and they had a couple of tough players for us defensively,” Filpus said. “They played well down the stretch, but we had two really good runs. It was hard to match them basket-for-basket for 32 minutes.”

The Gremlins’ season ended at 21-6 with a strong run to the state quarterfinals with wins over Kingsford and Escanaba to win the District 33 title. They followed those up with wins over Kingsley and Big Rapids to earn the Region 9 title. They closed the season winning six of their last eight games.

Filpus was very proud of how her team grew together, especially after the tough stretch in February where they lost four times in five games and struggled with their confidence.

“I’m just very proud of the growth that we saw the last five games of the regular season, and into the playoffs,” said Filpus. “We’ve seen our kids have confidence issues, and in some of our close games in February, we didn’t come out on the right end of that. But, they just never lost focus, our vision, in postseason success.

“I think those defeats, and the frustration from those defeats, shaped us. The results were (that) we’ve earned a district and a regional championship for our program.”

The Gremlins will graduate nine of their 12 girls from this year’s group.

Scoring

FHS 12 12 11 16 – 51

HHS 5 9 13 9 – 36

FHS – McLaughlin 16, Conzelmann 10, Brenner 3, Bernthal 4, Boyke 18.

HHS – Peterson 3, Markham 13, Wickstrom 6, Trewhella 12, Ryynanen 2.