Information courtesy of MLC Athletics

MEN’S BASKETBALL

Northland 78, MLC 75

ASHLAND, Wis. — On Saturday, the Martin Luther College men’s basketball faced off against the Northland Lumberjacks for their second matchup of the season.

The two squads previously met on Dec. 9, 2022, when the Knights lost 65-52. In that game, MLC was unable to keep up with the depth of Northland and fell to the Lumberjacks.

On Saturday afternoon, MLC managed to stay close throughout the 40 minutes of action and took the lead at several moments in the second half, but ultimately fell to Northland 78-75.

MLC (2-18, 0-10) fought tough in the first half, but trailed Northland 31-21 at the 3:54 mark. The Knights would then turn things up defensively and went on an 11-2 run to come within two points, making it 33-31. The Knights did a nice job of breaking the Northland press and drew shooting fouls near the basket. The Lumberjacks answered the run with several baskets and led MLC 40-33 going into halftime.

Northland opened up the second half with a 14-point lead, as the Lumberjacks came out of the break shooting the ball well. From there, MLC responded from the double-digit deficit with key 3-point shots from Micah Kieselhorst and Ethan Kjenstad. The corner 3-pointer from Kjenstad pulled the Knights within a point (57-56) at the 13:46 mark. The freshman followed up the triple with a turnaround jumper to give the Knights their first lead of the game 58-56. Both teams would trade baskets from that point on and the Knights would expand their lead to 5 points, after a transition layup from Kieselhorst made it 70-65.

The Lumberjacks tightened up defensively in the final 5 minutes and their full court press seemed to disrupt MLC’s timing offensively. Ina addition, The Lumberjacks answered their deficit at the charity stripe and with tough points inside, as their leading scorer Jordan Brennan hit key free throws and a short corner jumper to give Northland a 78-75 lead with 2:23 remaining. After that bucket from Brennan, neither team scored again and the Knights would have several opportunities to tie or take the lead, including a 3-point attempt from Kjenstad at the buzzer.

Despite the loss for MLC, the Knights gave their best performance of the conference season and remained competitive deep into the second half. MLC did shoot the ball well as a team going 25-of-61 (41 percent) and received a 20 point performance from both Kieselhorst and Thomas Balge. Kjenstad also had one of his better games of the year, with a season-high 17 points.

MLC will look to build some momentum on their effort Saturday and shift their focus to a road game at Beloit on Tuesday. The game was previously scheduled in December but was postponed due to bad weather conditions.

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Northland 70, MLC 50

ASHLAND, Wis. — The Martin Luther College women’s basketball followed the men’s close loss and looked to snag one road win for the Knights on their road trip up to Northern Wisconsin on Saturday.

The Knights fell to Northland in their previous game in early December. The difference proved to be a double-double performance from Miranda Wagner who put up 23 points and 10 rebounds.

This time around, Wagner showed that that performance wasn’t a one-time fluke and put up 30 points in Saturday’s contest to lead the Lumberjills to a 70-50 win over MLC.

Northland shot 38 percent as a team in the first half from 3-point territory and utilized their backcourt’s shooting ability early on. The Knights shot 1 of 9 (25 percent) from beyond the 3-point line, but still played hard and found decent looks inside the paint, especially from Emma Nelson. The junior picked up her fourth double-double of the season with 15 points and 10 rebounds on 38.9 percent shooting from the field. MLC entered the break down 37-25, despite the lack of outside shooting and looked to slow down the Northland offense in the second half.

To start the second half, MLC guarded the perimeter much better, but the Lumberjills found other ways to score the ball and converted at the free throw line after driving hard to the basket. Northland ended the third quarter with a 54-40 advantage and would ultimately seal the victory up after holding MLC to just one field goal in the fourth quarter. Despite just scoring one field goal, the Knights shot 8 of 10 from the charity stripe in the final quarter. MLC was unable to stop Wagner from scoring inside and out and had a difficult time keeping Bailey Wynn off the glass, who finished with 14 points and 11 rebounds.

The Knights have been successful over the years against Northland and even with the loss go to (18-8) all-time against the Lumberjills.

MLC (8-13, 1-9) will return to action on Friday when they face UM-Morris on the road. The Knights will look to avenge their previous loss to the Cougars which came a couple weeks ago.