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MARQUETTE — The Northern Michigan University women’s basketball team went toe to toe for 40 minutes with the GLIAC’s hottest team in Northwood, but came up a possession short in a 78-75 defeat on Saturday afternoon.

Northwood (13-6, 7-5 GLIAC) built its winning streak to seven games after a rocky 0-5 start in conference play, and they’re especially hard to beat shooting 54% from the 3-point line with 13 of them, and 45% overall from the field.

Despite this, NMU (8-8, 3-6 GLIAC) had a chance to tie the game on the final possession, but Emily Mueller’s 3-pointer came up short in the final seconds.

Northern Michigan University women's basketball head coach Troy Mattson signals instructions to the Wildcats during the third quarter of a GLIAC game played against Northwood at the Berry Events Center in Marquette on Saturday. (Photo courtesy Daryl T. Jarvinen)

NMU is not a team that usually scores 75 points, or gives up 78 for that matter, but Northern has now shown the ability to hang in many types of games.

The Wildcats trailed 76-71 with under two minutes left, but Mueller willed her team back in it with two straight baskets to make it 76-75 with 40 seconds to go. Free throws from Alli Keyser put Northwood up by three with 26.1 seconds left before NMU had the open look from Mueller fall short.

“If you weren’t coaching the game, it must’ve been an entertaining game to watch,” NMU coach Troy Mattson said. “There were a lot of exciting plays, (and) I have to give Northwood all the credit in the world.

“Not a lot of teams are going to come up here and beat Michigan Tech (which Northwood did on Thursday) and Northern Michigan, and they were able to do that this weekend. They made 15 3’s against Tech, they made 13 against us shooting at a percentage that’s over 60% from the 3-point line and they were just hitting the bottom of the net.”

Seven Timberwolves made a 3-pointer, four of them scoring in double figures. Keyser led all scorers with 21 points, going 8 of 11 from the field and 3 of 4 from deep. Teammates Ellie Taylor and Maizie Taylor each had 12 points, while Makenzie Todd finished with 10.

Mueller led NMU with 18 points, while Vivianne Jende finished with 14 and Elizabeth Lutz 11. Makaylee Kuhn was held to only six points in the game, all coming in the second half. The Wildcats are now 1-2 in their past three games, all at home. However, playing against Grand Valley State and Northwood is an easy way to tarnish a record.

“It’s a bitter defeat, I thought we played really well the last three nights out,” Mattson said. “We just happened to be playing against two really good teams against Grand Valley and Northwood, and now we have Michigan Tech coming in, we got three really good teams coming in here.

“It’s been tough, but my girls, we’re going to fight and we’ll figure it out.”

The inordinate amount of offense began right off the bat as NMU took a 21-18 lead after one quarter. Jende was on fire in that opening period, scoring 10 of her 14 points. Neither team could separate in the second quarter, either, as it appeared every time Northern would take the lead, Northwood was there with a triple for an answer. The Timberwolves rallied to take a 41-37 halftime lead, which can be credited to four 3’s alone in the quarter. Maizie Taylor’s 12 points all came in the first half as she hit four of Northwood’s seven 3-pointers.

Northwood finally appeared to gain some separation by boosting their lead to 58-50 with two minutes left in the third. But NMU took every Timberwolves’ punch and stayed in it despite Northwood’s offense not slowing down. Trailing 61-54 in the final seconds of the third, Ana Rhude got a shot to go down and cut the deficit to five.

Northern had a strong start to the fourth quarter with a Kuhn jumper and a 3-pointer from Taya Stevenson to tie it 61-61. On the ensuing possession, Stevenson was fouled in the corner on a 3-point try, and her free throws gave the Wildcats a 64-61 advantage with eight minutes to play. Northwood jumped back out in front and took a one-point lead before Ellie Taylor nailed a 3 to make it 73-69 with four minutes to go. Mueller scored down low to cut it down to two, but Alana Nelson sank another 3-pointer.

Mueller had clutch baskets down the stretch, but it just wasn’t enough to combat Northwood’s prolific offense.

“That’s a team that got into the national tournament last year, and they’re showing it right now,” Mattson said. “They’re really playing well, and they’re really gutting it out because they were off to a really slow start this year with a new coach and a new system.

“But they’ve figured it out as of recently, and they’re not going to be an easy out for anybody.”

NMU hosts Michigan Tech in their Upper Peninsula rivalry game at 5:30 p.m. today. The game is scheduled to be telecast on WLUC-TV6 or Fox-U.P.

Travis Nelson can be reached by email at tnelson@miningjournal.net.