David Archambeau/For the Gazette Michigan Tech guard Marcus Tomashek looks for a teammate to pass the ball to during a game against Northern Michigan Thurday at the SDC Gym in Houghton.

HOUGHTON — For most of the first 35 minutes Thursday night, the Michigan Tech Huskies men’s basketball team held a sizable lead over their rivals from 100 miles down the road, the Northern Michigan Wildcats. The Wildcats shaved a 17-point advantage with 9:02 left in the second half down to just even with 48.8 seconds left.

Then the Huskies’ leading scorer did what he does so well. He hit a jump shot off the glass with 37.6 seconds left and Michigan Tech held on from there to earn the win, 67-64, at the SDC Gym.

With the win, the Huskies improved to 19-6 overall, 14-3 in the GLIAC, and 12-0 at home.

“There’s the one thing you got about all these teams, there’s a heck of a chance you run into them again, so you need to stay on there,” said Huskies coach Josh Buettner. “Right now, that’s a good win. That’s not a master class and how to play with a 17-point lead. But, credit to Northern. They made some plays. They kept fighting, and had a chance to win the game. We’re very fortunate to get out of here with a win.”

The Huskies have won seven of their last eight games, each in a different fashion, which is not lost on Buettner.

“Hopefully we’re learning the things not to do in terms of how to close out a game properly,” he said. “But, I do think our guys are confident that no matter the scenario at this point, we’re going to give ourselves a chance. They keep playing. ‘Mark’ (Marcus) missed two free throws. He misses a layup, and then feels like everything’s going wrong, and then he bangs a three. The level of confidence to do that is pretty incredible as well.

“We do need to be sharper down the stretch. Holding them to 64 is pretty good, but you can’t give up that many in a row towards the end. I want to see the film. It felt like we were still getting good shots, and we just couldn’t get anything to go down the stretch.”

Tomashek, who led all scorers with 21 points, did not shoot well by his standards, but there is no one else the Huskies want to have the ball in the final seconds.

“That’s the awesomeness of having Marcus,” Buettner said. “He comes over to the sideline there, and he’s like let’s get a two-for-one, and just let me go. I get to the rim and make something happen. OK, that’s a pretty easy play call at that point, and you know what, it’s pretty awesome to have a guy that can do that.”

Along with Tomashek, Buettner had high praise for the efforts of other key performers for the Huskies, including sophomore guard Matt Schmainda who hit a key 3-pointer seven minutes in, but even more impressive to his coach was the way he tracked down a missed Pete Calcaterra free throw with 1:48 left in the first half, and got the ball quickly over to senior guard Adam Hobson, who hit a 3-pointer from the left corner.

“The play of the game for Matt in the first half,” said Buettner, “was that rebound off the offensive that got us turned it into a four-point possession.”

Hobson finished his day with 13 points, including back-to-back threes just over halfway through the second half to put the Huskies up 54-37 at the time.

As well as the Huskies played defensively, they struggled to find a way to contain the play of the Wildcats’ Dylan Kuehl, who had a team-high 19 points in the contest. Buettner turned to a pair of defenders, junior guard Josh Terrian and freshman guard Gabe Smith, to try to keep him at bay as much as they could.

“He can just work on getting himself to anywhere within 15 feet of the basket, just turn, and just jump over the top of you,” Buettner said. “That stuff’s hard to deal with. Just getting a good contest without falling is really hard. I think Josh and Gabe did a really nice job both. Josh is kind of doing it with some physicality and beating him to spots, which is huge, and Gabe, obviously, is long and more athletic, and gives him a different look.

“It’s really nice having two just terrific defenders like that that are both very effective, but both very different. That can be hard on an offensive player too. When you’re getting used to one guy, and you put the other guy on there, it’s completely different, but still effective. So, having that kind of versatility defensively is pretty cool.”

Beyond Kuehl, the only other Wildcats player who proved consistently difficult to guard was Sam Privet, who finished with 13 points. However, he took a tough foul in the final seconds which put Tomashek at the line with a chance to seal the win.

UP NEXT

The Huskies do not have much time to celebrate their 19th win of the season, as they have to travel to Chicago to face the Roosevelt Lakers on Saturday at 4 p.m.