Wayland’s gritty 41-38 victory Friday night over Hudsonville begs the question: “So just how good are the Lady Wildcats?”

Overlooked by the media at the start of the season, coach Marty Howard’s legions have reeled off three consecutive triumphs over three of MLive Grand Rapids’ “Five Teams to Watch” this winter. They beat Rockford in the season opener and followed that up with a win over Wyoming. One week later, they’re 3-0 and wondering if they’re as good as the Grand Rapids Catholic Central squad (another of the “five”) that limited West Catholic to just 10 points. Talk about defense!

Defense indeed seems to be at the heart of a scrappy Wayland group that was written off far too early because it lost to graduation perhaps the finest Wildcat girls’ cager ever in Presley Hudson, who’s now lighting up the scoreboard for Central Michigan University.

This is a very different Wildcat group. It has speed, quickness, depth and these ladies know how to box out to get rebounds. And Howard seems to be on a mission to prove that “Tenacious D” is more than just the name of a rock band.

Wayland used its classic helter-skelter full-court pressure to take leads of between three and five points throughout most of the first half. Forward Hope Dollarhide nailed a three in the first minute and senior guard Ali Martus took a nifty pass inside from Bethany Teunissen for a layup to stake the ‘Cats to a 5-0 lead.

But Hudsonville obviously is a team to be reckoned with, keeping things reasonably close.

The offensive gun for Wayland in the early going was senior co-captain Ali Cutler, who dropped in nine points in the first nine minutes, and at one point in the second period the Lady Wildcats were up by seven, 20-13.

It took strong inside efforts by 6-footer Chloe Guingrich and the outside shooting of sophomore guard Kasey DeSmit for the Eagles to keep pace and they were down by five, 25-20 at intermission.

Wayland took it biggest lead of the night early in the third quarter on a three-pointer by Martus, but then the offense went south, throwing as many intercepted passes as Peyton Manning.

Hudsonville turned those steals into easy fast-break buckets and scored nine unanswered points to overtake the ‘Cats 31-30 with 3:46 left in the third quarter.

Martus then came up with a clutch three to stop the bleeding and the lead see-sawed throughout most of the remainder of the contest.

When burly center Shaina DenBesten scored inside, she staked the Eagles to a 34-33 advantage to start the final eight minutes, which turned into a bruising defensive war. The Wildcats were up to the challenge, limiting Hudsonville to just four points in the fourth period.

Lady Wildcat senior forward Mckaylah Donewald, the other 6-footer on the floor, came up with her career-best performance, scoring 10 points and gathering a boatload of rebounds, most of them during Wayland’s awful second half offensive slump.

Down the stretch, the ball was put into the hands of Cutler, who swished a pair of free throws at 2:19 and then Donewald nailed two more at 1:35.

The ‘Cats had possession of the basketball and a three-point lead with only 30 seconds showing on the clock, but they failed to convert. Hudsonville coach Kasey Glass called time with 11 seconds left and tried to get DeSmit the basketball for an open three to tie the ballgame. He got just what he wanted, but she missed and Dollarhide came down with rebound and Sydney Ritz did the same with 2.3 seconds remaining to seal the deal.

The balanced scoring: Cutler had 11 points, Donewald 10, Dollarhide nine and Martus eight. For Hudsonville, DeSmit scored 14 and DenBesten eight, as Wayland held its opponent to fewer than 40 points for the second straight time.

Will Class A Caledonia stop the Lady Wildcats at the Scots’ gym Tuesday evening?

PHOTO: Mckaylah Donewald came up big for the Wildcats in clutch situations, scoring 10 points and hauling down crucial rebounds. (Photo courtesy of Kenny Ritz)