It was a festive Seniors Night celebration at Martin High School, where the home team cruised to its 17th victory in 18 starts by turning back Fennville, 51-38.
The Lady Clippers now have a showdown for the Southwest Athletic Conference championship Friday at home against Gobles, the only team this season to beat them, on a 33-31 buzzer beater. The Tigers are once beaten in league play, just like Martin, but they are 16-2 overall.
The reason for the great season, as always, was defense. Fennville, led by high-scoring senior guard Coryne Howard, was held to just four points in the first period and two in the third. Howard exploded offensively in the last eight minutes, scoring 16 of her game-high 23 points, but it was interesting that she had only seven over the first three quarters.
Martin got a hot start from senior pivot Freddie Elkins, who scored all six of her points in the first period and provided lots of rebounding.
But it was the deadeye shooting from guard Jaclyn Hildebrand and steals and layups off defense by Kiaya Warner that was the showcase. Hildebrand finished with 12 points that included three threes and Warner finished with 10. Faith Guritz the steady and reliable inside scorer who last week recorded her 1,000th career point, had only six points, but it really didn’t matter. Sophomore Gracie Shettler also scored six points.
Martin was enjoying a 38-17 rout after three periods before Howard went berserk on a one-woman offensive mission that was too late.
Later in the evening, the Martin boys pulled off a 53-49 upset over Fennville, the first-place team in the SAC, to lifts its overall record to 7-9.
