Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties
Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties
By JASON JUNO
Bessemer — Coming into 2025, Wakefield-Marenisco wasn’t the team with a scoring problem. Bessemer was the one who failed to hit the 40-point mark twice, while the Cardinals hadn’t scored under 44 points in a game.
The Speedboys turned the tables on the Cardinals, holding them to a season-low scoring output in a 45-37 victory Thursday night.
“We couldn’t score, we couldn’t make a shot,” W-M coach Pat Libertoski said. “We must have missed 10 wide-open 3s. What are you going to do? Bottom line is you can’t score, you can’t win in basketball.”
The Speedboys’ start meant they played with a lead all night. They led 6-0 and 14-5, and while W-M pulled within one, 16-15, early in the second quarter, the Speedboys took back control for a 23-18 halftime lead.
Bessemer coach Richard Matrella talked about the old games he watches, mostly with good results for his teams, and how rarely they started trailing by the margins his team led by early.
When he watches this tape, he’s going to like the effort his team played with. He pointed to a play in the third quarter where Gabe Harju was one of three Speedboys to go to the ground for a loose ball. They got it and it started a run that took them into the fourth quarter ahead 36-27.
“Our offense still isn’t all there obviously, but this was a grit game, play good defense, good hustle,” Matrella said. “That play right there says everything about how much the kids wanted to win it.”
And they handled W-M’s 3-point barrage; they made six, but Bessemer most importantly handled the misses.
“What you have to is when they have their misses, you have to get the rebounds and we did that,” Matrella said.
Helping that cause was having back Leland Hollenbeck, who returned from an ankle injury to lead the Speedboys with 12 points. Cayden Harju had 10.
Patrick Perron made three 3s and led W-M with 11 points; no one else hit double figures, though.
“Defense wasn’t bad,” Libertoski said. “But we gotta score more than 30-something. The nice thing is it’s January, not the end of the year, we have time to get it right.”
W-M fell to 2-4 and Bessemer improved to 1-3.
Bessemer — CJay Wainio 3, Cayden Harju 10, Gus Matrella 4, Gabe Harju 7, Aiden Partanen 9, Leland Hollenbeck 12. FTs: 10-17. Fouls: 10. Fouled out: None. 3-pointers: C. Harju 2, Wainio 1.
W-M — Brock Pangrazzi 9, Bode Lynott 1, Chase Lane 9, Garett Prisbe 4, Patrick Perron 11, Owen Miljevich 1, Eli Hewitt 2. FTs: 5-10. Fouls: 13. Fouled out: None. 3-pointers: Perron 3, Pangrazzi 2, Lane 1.
Bessemer 16 23 36 45
W-M 10 18 27 37
