Marquette’s Aspen Michelin brings the ball upcourt against Traverse City Central in a MHSAA Division 1 district championship game played at the Redettes’ court on Friday. (Journal photo by Kat Torreano)

MARQUETTE — The Marquette girls have picked the perfect time for one of the ups in their rollercoaster season.

The Redettes won their third MHSAA Division 1 tournament game this week with a 49-35 victory over Traverse City Central to secure the district championship on Friday night at the Barb Crill Gymnasium.

“It’s been a season of ups and downs,” MSHS veteran head coach Ben Smith said. “We started out by losing our first two, then we won nine in a row, lost four straight, then won a handful (to be exact, four in a row) before we lost our final regular-season game at Menominee.

“Some of it has to do with who we’ve played, but when you don’t play well for 32 minutes, you’re often not going to win.

“I’m really happy right now after this week with a ton of travel, then coming home tonight.”

The Redettes played — and won — in the Lower Peninsula at Petoskey on Monday night and at Alpena on Wednesday night.

And they’ll be back to crossing the Mackinac Bridge again for the regionals next week, traveling to Gaylord to play Midland Dow on Tuesday night, and if they win, going even further south to Mount Pleasant to play Saginaw Heritage or Flint Carmen-Ainsworth for the regional final on Thursday.

But on Friday, home cooking did the Redettes a world of good.

After leads of 5-0 and 14-6 by Marquette, the visiting Trojans clawed back and hung close and were within 16-13 with six minutes left in the first half and 21-15 with 48 seconds to go.

But the Redettes’ Aspen Michelin broke loose for a late 3-pointer to put her team up 24-15 at the break.

Michelin was Marquette’s dominant offensive force, scoring a game-high 21 points as she was 6 of 7 at the free throw line to go with four assists.

“This is really awesome,” said MSHS sophomore Zoe Smith, who got to see some time in the game’s late stages.

When asked who among her teammates really stood out, she said “Aspen is always playing as hard as she can.”

Teammate Maddie Carter added 11 points, going 3 for 3 on free throws while adding six rebounds, four assists and three blocked shots.

The sometimes frenetic pace of the first half that didn’t produce a lot of points showed the grit of his Central team, head coach Greg Farmer said.

“We’ve turned the corner in this last part of the season,” he said of a 2-13 start ending at 7-15. “Part of it was having a really tough schedule early, but really, our seniors showed their leadership and just decided they would never quit.

“We have seven of them on the team.”

As far as Friday night went, Farmer said the Trojans’ strategy didn’t seem to work well against Marquette.

“We tried to spread them out and use our quickness, but (Marquette) collapsed pretty well and didn’t give us easy shots.

“Ben (Smith) just does a terrific job with them.”

Defense is something a Ben Smith-coached team always hangs its hat on, and Friday was no different.

“We gave up 11 points in the first quarter, but then in the second and third quarters combined, they had just 10 points,” Smith said. “That’s where the difference in the game was. We try to take teams out of their comfort zone.

“But now we’ve got to put together more consistency more of the time if we want to continue with this season.”

The Redettes really took over in the second half, doubling their nine-point halftime advantage with a 9-0 run in the first 2 1/2 minutes of the third quarter to go up 33-15.

Leading 37-21 after three quarters, Marquette upped it to a 20-point edge barely a minute into the fourth, 41-21, when Carter took a pass in the lane for a short turnaround jumper.

Both teams started putting points up later in the quarter as the substitutes entered and the fouls mounted into the bonus, then double bonus situations down the stretch.

Carina Stewart, who Smith said was a focus of his team’s defense, led TCC with 15 points and nine rebounds as she sank a trio of triples and all four of her free-throw tries.

“Stewart is quite a player,” the Marquette coach said. “She can get to rim and make 3s too. We tried to limit her as much as we could.

“We know if she gets going, she becomes the focus of their offense.”

Steve Brownlee can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 252. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.