From left, Gwinn's Tierra Taylor looks to catch a pass as Norway's Jordan Kraemer and Britt Grayvold defend Modeltowners ball handler Kia Evans during a Mid-Peninsula Conference game played in Norway on Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017. (Iron Mountain Daily News photo by Burt Angeli)

NORWAY — Norway achieved a long-anticipated goal on Thursday, clinching its first outright girls basketball title in the Mid-Peninsula Conference since 1985 with a 54-34 victory over Gwinn.

The unbeaten Knights (18-0, 11-0 M-PC) charged out to a 21-5 lead in the first quarter.

“We’ve been right there before and now we finally did it,” said Norway coach Carli Kelly, referring to a couple other seasons where the Knights came up short. “I’m proud of the girls. We took it game by game, whatever happened happened, and here we are.”

Jordan Kraemer, honored before the game for becoming the all-time leading scorer for the Norway girls, added 28 points for a new total of 1,310.

“You have to do the little goals before you get the big ones,” said Kelly, who was discussing the team but could have put Kraemer in that statement. “Every day we have a goal, every day in practice we have a goal. Every game I give them a certain challenge that they have to meet. I think that helps them mentally focus a little bit better.”

Gwinn coach Ben Olsen has watched too many games this season with results like Thursday’s first quarter.

“We got down by 16 points in the first quarter and we lost by 20,” Olsen said. “If you want to look at what happened it was obviously that first quarter. That’s kind of been a microcosm of our season. We have one bad quarter every game.”

Norway defeated Iron Mountain on Wednesday to clinch a share of the M-PC title.

The Knights held a 38-16 lead at intermission.

Gwinn, hurt by 22 turnovers, collected a team-high 13 points and 12 rebounds from sophomore Trisha McGuire. Tierra Taylor had nine points.

“We don’t have a team that can play back from that (first-quarter deficit),” Olsen said.

Gwinn won the JV game, 38-30.