job against their zone and ….

job against their zone and got them out of it.

“Defensively we weren’t quite in great position always in the first half,” he said. “I thought in the second half we did better. You need to give them credit, they hit their shots when they needed to.”

The lead continued to see-saw early in the second half. Baker’s three-point play gave Medford a 33-30 edge. Schlampp’s 3 tied it. Orr’s triple put Rice Lake up 36-35, Baumgartner’s free throw tied it and Belongia’s offensive stickback put the Warriors up 38-36. That set the stage for Sullivan’s 3s and the run that seemingly was going to put Medford over the top.

“Joey was huge,” Brown said. “Early on, Nate Retterath got us going with a number of shots, and then we got it into Brady. That was kind of our first half. Joey was the zone buster in that second half. That really got our energy going. I thought between Peyton and Logan, they got a number of good looks that were going to go in. They were just in and out. Joey and Brady really kept us going in that second half. For the other guys, they got good looks, it just wasn’t our night to knock down the shots.”

Hupf’s 15 points led Medford. He was seven of 11 from the field, dished out four assists and had four rebounds. Sullivan scored nine points, while Baker had eight points and five rebounds. The Warriors held Baumgartner to seven points, though he had five assists, four steals and seven rebounds. Kuhn, obviously not at 100% after injuring his ankle the previous week, was held to six points and none in the second half. He had three assists. Retterath had six points, five rebounds and two assists.

“It takes nothing away from these seniors and this team and how hard they worked to get here,” Brown said. “They have the most wins in school history and to do some of the things they did in the GNC and our regional was outstanding. It always hurts to lose and we really wanted the opportunity to play the number- one team in the state. That’s what playoff basketball is about. You have to bring it every night. It wasn’t a lack of bringing it, but you’ve got to be on your A-game. You get to the sectionals and you need to be on your game.”

Kuhn, Hupf, Baker, Retterath and Owen Wipf will be a tough senior class to replace. Brown said there certainly are players on the roster who can lead Medford back to contention next winter.

“I think we have a number of good pieces,” he said. “The kids are going to have to work hard because we’re going to lose a lot, especially with just the strength and the physical aspect that you get from seniors like Brady, Nate, Ty and Peyton. They’re just physically strong kids. Then we had guys like Owen that just defend and do whatever you asked.

“I was really blessed this year to have Owen and Chubs (Guden) because they would do whatever I needed,” he continued. “If I needed them to play a lot and they had to step in, they played great. Joe was that way too. He was almost like a sixth starter. If we were in games like we were in playoffs where we only played six or seven guys in the second half, they were OK with whatever the team needed. That took a lot of pressure off me to make the decisions I needed to make that were best for us. They were willing to do whatever it took to help us. We lose a lot, but we lost a lot last year, so now it’s up to those younger guys to step up and work hard and get stronger and hopefully we come back next year just as strong.”