The Wayland girls’ varsity basketball team advanced to Thursday night’s regional finals with a 42-31 victory over Dowagiac, but Martin girls’ season came to an end with a 43-40 loss to Muskegon Heights Academy.

The Lady Wildcats built early leads of 20-11 and 29-13 after the first two periods and then had to hang on the rest of the way. Their record now is 15-8 overall and they will play Edwardsburg, which beat Otsego in the other regional semifinal, in the regional finals at Vicksburg.

Interestingly, Wayland defeated Edwardsburg last year in the regional finals.

Martin also built early leads, up by 15 at the half, but somehow the Muskegon quintet was able to come back and overtake the Lady Clippers.

“It was a gut-wrenching loss for us tonight after being up 15 at the half,” said coach Ben Schipper. “We played so well in the first half. Gracie Shettler shot the lights out hitting five threes in the first half, four in the second quarter. The team was aggressive and playing so well together.

“After halftime, Muskegon Heights came out in a triangle and two, full denying Makala Goddard and Gracie. They played that for much of the second half as we struggled mightily to get into our offense against it. They started pounding the ball into the low post and we had trouble containing her. When we did, we weren’t able to get to our normal defensive rotations and they got easy buckets on the backside block.”

Muskegon hit two dagger threes deep in the corner near the end of the fourth period that tied the game and then put them up by the final three-point margin. 

Shettler finished with 22 points in her last game as a Lady Clipper.

“Despite our disappointing finish, we’re so proud of every girl on our team,” the coach added. “We improved so much from beginning to end and that’s the goal. To play your best at the end. Other than tonight’s second half, we were absolutely accomplishing that.”

He mentioned his appreciation to Shettler, Maddy Bogdan and Jenna Marsman for their contributions to the program and well representing Martin girls basketball in the best way.

Martin ended the season with an overall record of 11-12 and claimed its fifth consecutive district championship last week.