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Border Bash-bound: 3 Upper Peninsula Dream Team basketball players from area named to Ironwood tournament to play Wisconsin all-stars

Negaunee's Natalie Bartle, center, gets off a shot over Westwood defenders Karlie Patron, left, and Elizabeth Farley in their Class C district tournament game played at Ishpeming High School on Feb. 28. (Photo courtesy Daryl T. Jarvinen)

IRONWOOD — Last year’s Kiwanis Border Bash all-star basketball game wasn’t going to be easy to top, not with members of the three-time Michigan state champion North Central boys team filling the Lindquist Center gym and leading the Northern Michigan team to a victory.

“That’s what everybody was telling me, but I think we got close” for this year’s games, event director Russ Maki said. “We should pack that gym again.”

The fifth annual event will be held on Wednesday, June 6, at Gogebic Community College in Ironwood and pits teams of players from the Upper Peninsula vs. northern Wisconsin. The girls game begins at 6:30 p.m. EDT and the boys at 8 p.m. EDT.

It is separate from the U.P. All-Star Classic that is an intra-peninsula clash in its 33rd year and put on by the U.P. Sports Hall of Fame. The site rotates around the U.P. and was held at Marquette Senior High School in 2017.

Three area seniors, each named All-U.P. Dream Team selections about a month ago by the U.P. Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association, have been invited to the Border Bash.

Ishpeming's Hart Holmgren splits Iron Mountain defenders Jaden Vicenzi, left, and Charlie Gerhard as Holmgren drives to the basket in a game played at the Hematites' gym on Feb. 21. (Photo courtesy Daryl T. Jarvinen)

They are Ishpeming boys player Hart Holmgren, Negaunee girls player Natalie Bartle and Ishpeming girls player Madigan Johns.

Holmgren, who will play his college ball at Northern Michigan University, also set the Hematites’ boys all-time scoring record this season, Bartle was an Associated Press Class C all-state first team selection, and Johns was named Mid-Peninsula Conference Player of the Year this season.

Also headlining the talented U.P. group is Ewen-Trout Creek’s Jake Witt, who was named U.P. Class D Player of the Year and also Mr. U.P. Basketball at the UPSSA meeting.

Maki is excited to see Witt match up with Northern Wisconsin’s Owen White of Rhinelander in the boys contest. Witt checks in at 6-foot-7, White at 6-6 and both will be playing basketball at Michigan Tech.

“I think that’s going to be the headline of the whole thing, those two,” Maki said.

Ishpeming's Madigan Johns, left, takes a shot against Gladstone's Erin Stevenson during a game played Feb. 6 at the Hematites' gym. (Photo courtesy Daryl T. Jarvinen)

On the girls side, Maki expects a good battle inside between a pair of 6-1 girls, Flambeau, Wisconsin’s Jordan Ludescher and Miss U.P. Basketball Linnie Gustafson of St. Ignace.

There’s certainly a lot more talent on the teams, which includes players from both U.P. teams to advance to Michigan Class D semifinals, the Chassell girls and Dollar Bay boys.

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