Petoskey basketball takes weekend split, learns about 2023-24 squad

PETOSKEY — When you’ve built a program like Petoskey basketball has over several decades, the first week always brings a lot of pressure.

There’s certainly always a lot of eyeballs watching and waiting to see what kind of team the Northmen will have.

After a 2-1 start to the 2023-24 season – which came with a split in their Sean Pollion Memorial Tournament over the weekend – some questions were answered and others formed.

That’s pretty typical of the first week.

After defeating Grayling easily in the opener earlier in the week, the weekend came with a 56-45 loss against Grand Ledge that played out closer throughout the night, then a 59-30 victory over Elk Rapids Saturday.

For Northmen head coach Matt Tamm, bouncing right back against the Elks Saturday was good to see, especially without any practice time or film in between early in the year.

“It was a nice team effort,” Tamm said. “We had 11 guys dress today and 11 guys contributed. I just liked our effort. We’re gong to continue to get better. This is a team that will continue to improve as we identify some of the areas of our game that we need to work on.”

Some of those areas of improvement are things every team goes through early in the season, but a big piece for the Northmen – from the weekend at least – is just getting shots to fall more.

It was a tough shooting night Friday against Grand Ledge, with just a 5 of 27 clip from outside, then some of the same struggles continued against the Elks.

The 59 points were an improvement Saturday, though Jimmy Marshall led with 13 and nobody else was over eight, which Brady Odenbach met. The positive was that nine different players scored, a night after 10 players scored against the Comets.

Outside of the shots, Tamm points to a couple other areas that'll need to be looked at.

“We need to do a better job taking care of the ball,” Tamm said. “We’re becoming more physical, which I’m after, but we need to clean it up at the same time. We can’t be putting our opposition to the line as much as we are. We are going to get fouls, but if we can clean it up, that’ll be great.”

That second part was an issue Friday night against Grand Blanc, though there’s another issue that came out of that game, when Petoskey senior Shane Izzard went down with a knee injury in the first half.

Izzard, an All-Big North guard a year ago, didn’t return over the weekend and will be looked at Monday to assess the extent of the injury.

“We don’t know what we don’t know,” said Tamm. “He’s supposed to get an MRI, but he’s a three-year starter for us and one of our team leaders at both ends of the court. We’re just hoping that he’s OK and we’re just trying to be optimistic.”

Petoskey senior forward Luke Matelski is confident in a guard heavy group around Izzard to step up and fill his shoes if needed.

“Honestly, some of the guys I know and trust to step up and play how we need them to,” said Matelski. “(Against Grand Ledge) I think we played really tough, the shots just weren’t falling. I thought it was a good game, we batted hard, we just need shots to fall.”

Like a lot of Tamm teams, this Petoskey group comes with players who all have a role on the court and winning basketball comes out of everyone playing their position how it’s meant to be played.

Without a lot of size around the lineup, Matelski is in a larger role than many, even if he won’t be one of the guys filling the stat sheet every night.

“I feel like I can bring some hard, down-low defense, some passing, screening,” he said. “I’m not really a scorer, but I know my role to screen, pass and support the shooters and do what I need to do.”

With the first-week jitters out of the way and some of the questions answered – others formed – the season really begins to amp up now for the Northmen.

They’ll take on Midland Dow at 6:30 p.m., Monday in a non-conference tilt, then head to Sault Ste. Marie the following week. There will also be four more games to go in the month of December.

So far, even with a loss and a player down, Tamm has parts to like about the season so far.

“We’re rebounding really well at both ends of the court, we just have to get the shots to fall for us,” he added. “But, I like our effort. I like this team.”

Contact or send game stats/info to Sports Editor Drew Kochanny at dkochanny@petoskeynews.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @DrewKochanny, and Instagram, @drewkochanny

This article originally appeared on The Petoskey News-Review: Petoskey splits against Grand Ledge, Elk Rapids in weekend tourney