Raiders roll past the Tigers; 3-point record falls vs. T-Birds

MEDFORD BOYS BASKETBALL

The Medford Raiders ended a stretch of three games in five days with a nice bounce-back victory Tuesday, taking care of New Richmond 72-63 in non-conference play at Raider Hall.

While beating their third Big Rivers Conference opponent of the season, the Raiders set the tone on offense by attacking at seemingly every opportunity with Joey Sullivan leading the way with 26 points, one off his season-high. Tanner Hraby scored 13 of his 17 points in the first half and Logan Baumgartner had a 17-point, 16-rebound double-double.

Defensively the Raiders faced another tough customer in 6-7 CJ Campbell, a 23.2-point per game scorer coming in. He finished with 25 Tuesday but had only eight points in the first half and scored a late eight after Medford had built an insurmountable 24-point second-half lead.

The Raiders improved to 9-5 overall, while the Tigers fell to 4-11.

“It was good because we know they’re better than their record,” Medford head coach Ryan Brown said. “Their last BRC game was against Eau Claire North, they lost by six. They lost to Eau Claire Memorial by eight. They beat Somerset by 25 (Monday) night. We knew Campbell was a good player, but we knew we could probably force him into some tough shots. I think he had to take a lot of shots to get to his point total.”

Sullivan scored 17 of his points in the first half. He and Hraby turned the game around after the Tigers took their only lead of the night at 18-17. Sullivan’s four free throws in a 49-second span put Medford back in front, then Hraby dropped in two straight 3-pointers in the right corner, one off a Baumgartner kickout and another off a transition push from Sullivan. Hraby attacked the rack on his next scoring chance to make it 29-18 and Sullivan extended the lead to 13 on a steal and score. Sullivan scored five more points and Hraby took a long defensive rebound the distance for a 38-26 halftime lead.

“Joe pushed the pace really well,” Brown said. “We had a good conversation because I was telling Joe to push and he said, ‘but coach you’re always telling us to be patient.’ I said ‘you have to understand I want you to absolutely push in those first four or five seconds but then if it’s not there, get into our stuff and make teams work.’ I thought he did a great job of that tonight pushing it up the floor and pushing off misses. We scored a lot of points in transition.”

The Raiders broke the game open early in the second half. Chubs Guden got a couple of early buckets and Baumgartner, who had a quiet four-point first half, broke out with three 3s and Sullivan added one to put Medford ahead 60-36 with nine minutes to go.

New Richmond chipped away behind eight points from Reis Hidde and Campbell’s late push, but there wasn’t enough time for the Tigers to get all the way back in it.

“We said sometimes he’s going to make some really tough shots,” Brown said of Medford’s defense against Campbell. “I thought Chubs and Sam (Blair) set the tone really good in the first half, especially when Sam had to come in for Chubs. He did a great job contesting him and staying in front and Logan cleaned up the boards.

“We were so willing to make the extra pass,” he added. “Logan has been a big scorer for us. Tonight he still scored well but he was a facilitator and rebounder. There were times where he got in the paint and made the extra pass to Tanner or whoever. Joe and Zach (Rudolph) did the same thing. Everybody was doing that.”

Guden scored a season-high eight points and Rudolph and Charlie Kleist each scored two points. Kleist got his first start, filling in for the ill Brigham Kelley.

“Enough can’t be said about Charlie tonight,” Brown said. “With Big Rig out, Charlie did a great job with his defense and rebounding.”

Sullivan had nine rebounds and 15 of Baumgartner’s rebounds were defensive. Kleist had four rebounds. Baumgartner had three assists and Sullivan had four steals.

The Raiders are home Friday for their first meeting of the season with Great Northern Conference rival Antigo. Tip time is 7:15 p.m. Medford will take a nonconference trip to Wausau West on Tuesday, make up a game at Antigo on Feb. 3 and then go to Tomahawk on Feb. 4.

Pines 76, Medford 64

While Mosinee received early attention with its undefeated start in league play and wins over Rhinelander and Medford, Northland Pines came into Raider Hall as a quiet GNC unbeaten because its games with the other contenders had been postponed.

But the Eagles took advantage of their first shot to make a statement in Saturday’s rescheduled game, using outstanding offensive execution to take down the Raiders 76-64.

A slim 30-27 halftime lead for Pines grew to 21 in the second half before the Raiders made a late run to get as close as nine. But with four players in double figures, the Eagles had enough firepower to end some long losing streaks the program had against Medford.

Medford teams had won 34 straight games over Northland Pines, dating back to a 55-50 loss in Eagle River on Jan. 14, 2005. Medford’s last loss to Pines at home was a 63-50 defeat on Jan. 13, 2004.

Northland Pines (4-1, 11-3) dropped a 59-56 heartbreaker at home to Mosinee (70, 15-1) Monday and the Eagles get their first shot at Rhinelander (4-1, 8-6) Friday.

“We scored the ball well,” Brown said. “Our defensive intensity wasn’t as good. A lot of credit to them. They took care of the ball. When we were late rimline and we were late doubling the post, that cost us a lot. There were some transition points too. We’re a pretty good transition defensive team and there were times where we had our back guys coming up. That never happens.”

The conductor of the Eagles’ offensive precision was junior point guard Nolan Lurvey, who had 18 points on seven-of-10 shooting and 13 assists. Junior forward Gabe Smith had 21 points on 10-of-16 shooting and had 21 points. Ryan Muench added 15 and Griffin Stiemke added 10.

One night after scoring 42 points against Lakeland, Baumgartner led Medford with 34 points and eight rebounds.

Sullivan’s pull-up jumper gave Medford its last lead at 16-14. The Eagles took the lead when Muench got a long defensive rebound and took it the other way, followed by a three-point play from Stiemke with 7:21 left in the first half. Sullivan’s putback at the buzzer got Medford within three at the break.

It was 39-34 after a three-point play from Baumgartner with 15:14 left when Pines went on its decisive run.

Smith started it with a bucket and Lurvey hit a 3. Muench hit a 3 and Smith scored twice inside to make it 49-34. Baumgartner scored, but McCanles and Lurvey drained triples to put Pines up 57-36 with 11:16 to go.

The Raiders got within 57-45 and had a Baumgartner 3-point try rim out with 6:10. Pines got a three-point play from Lurvey to get the lead back to 15. It went to 16 at 66-50 when Hraby hit a couple of 3s and scored off a steal by Guden to make it 68-58, but on a call that could’ve gone either way, Lurvey took a charge on Baumgartner, who tried to score off a Hraby steal with 2:00 to go, basically killing the late momentum Medford was trying to build Sullivan had 14 points for the Raiders, who didn’t shoot poorly themselves at 48% overall (24 of 50). Pines, however, shot 61.2% (30 of 49), including 24 of 35 on two-point shots. The Eagles scored 48 points in the paint, 20 more than Medford.

Hraby had 11 points, Rudolph hit a 3-pointer and Guden had two points and six assists.

“They’re a really good team and we knew that,” Brown said. “But I still was a little disappointed in some things that we know we can do better.”

Medford 78, Lakeland 45

Baumgartner went on a record-setting shooting spree Friday, knocking down 10 3-pointers and scoring 42 points in Medford’s 78-45 win over GNC rival Lakeland at Raider Hall.

The 10 triples broke the previous school record of nine, which Garrett Strebig hit twice during the 2016-17 season. Baumgartner’s 42 points for a single game ranks fourth in school history. He scored 30 of those in the second half.

“It was definitely something that was in my mind,” Baumgartner said. “Peyton (Kuhn) had eight in a game last year I think. I knew I could do what he did. I kinda learned a lot from him too, just with how he played and how he got open off screens and stuff like that. It’s great to have this feeling and shoot the way I know I can.

“It was just feeling good tonight,” he added. “Some of them felt off and they went in. Sometimes you just have those nights where everything is going in. Tonight was one of those nights.”

Things didn’t truly click for Medford until the second half. The Thunderbirds switched back and forth between 2-3 and 1-3-1 zones. The Raiders jumped ahead 20-9, a run that was capped by Baumgartner’s third 3-pointer of the half and followed an offensive rebound by Kelley. Sullivan added two bonus throws after that to extend the lead to 13. Lakeland whittled it down to 10 at 28-18 by halftime.

“We looked like we were just kind of drifting out there,” Brown said of the first half. “We didn’t move the ball well. We didn’t use good pass fakes and we turned it over too much. In the second half I thought we did much better. Our defense was pretty good. There are still some things we can get better at. Toward the end I thought we locked down pretty good. We moved the ball much better, skipped the ball, found our shooters and shooters made shots. When shooters make shots, it looks really good.”

The T-Birds pulled within 33-27 after five straight points from Chandler Savel, but a 3-pointer from Hraby sparked a 15-5 spurt that finally created some distance at 48-32. Baumgartner hit two 3s to make it 54-37 and then he hit another from the left corner and was fouled for a fourpoint play that made it 60-39 with 4:51 to go. That was the record tying 3. The record breaker came with 1:27 left. Screens from Blair and Steve Hraby gave him a wide-open left look and he buried it.

“Everyone contributed,” Baumgartner said. “Obviously I can’t get open unless people are screening for me, making pass fakes and passing it back to me for an open shot. I credit them. They’re great teammates. Coach Brown has a nice offense against a zone. We got a lot of open shots.”

“I didn’t even know (about the potential record) until he got to nine,” Brown said. “The coaches told me. Otherwise we probably would’ve pulled him at about five minutes. I wanted to give him a couple of chances. He had one and I was about to pull him and I said you get one more shot. Shoot a good shot, run the offense. The guys knew it and they got him a staggered and he knocked it down.”

Part of getting shots is other shooters drawing defensive attention. Hraby knocked down two 3s and had 12 points, four rebounds and three assists. Sullivan finished with 14 points, six rebounds, six assists and six steals. Charlie Kleist had four points and three boards. Rudolph hit a late 3 as did Anakin Stokes. Medford was 14 of 32 on 3s and 15 of 23 on twopoint shots to finish 52.7% from the field.

Will Fortier led Lakeland with 17 points, while Savel had 15.

“Big Rig and Charlie did a good job of screening the zone,” Brown said. “Sam and Zach did a good job in the middle, especially when Chubs got his fourth foul. We were able to attack some gaps and have three shooters out there. That’s a luxury where the defense can’t focus on one or the other. We had Tanner on one side hitting 3s and Logan on the other side. That’s hard to defend.”

Medford’s Logan Baumgartner spots up and makes his 10th 3-point shot late in Friday’s 78-45 win over Lakeland, breaking the school’s single-game record that had been held for five years by Garrett Strebig.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS

Medford’s Sophie Brost looks to pass out of the high post while guarded by Rice Lake’s Eliana Sheplee during Monday’s 69-42 loss at Raider Hall.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS