FENTON — Moments after the Hartland boys basketball team clinched its first district basketball title in six years, Gannon Grundman was still trying to process what his team had done.
“I’m speechless,” he said after the trophy presentation and group photos had concluded. “It’s hard to say. We lost there at Howell (in 2021), and , you know getting the chance to play them right now and beat them, it’s just great.”
The Eagles (18-4) took a 3-2 lead early on and never looked back in a 55-39 victory at Fenton High School. Hartland will take on Detroit Catholic Central in a regional semifinal at Lake Orion at 7 p.m. Monday.
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“I think it was a total team effort,” Hartland coach Kevin Blouin said. “I can’t pinpoint one guy. I think this team has been a team first and foremost, all season. It hasn’t been a one-man show. Different guys stepped up at different times, and it happened for us tonight.”
One of those guys was Ryan Bohlen. who had 13 points and ran the offense at point guard. He shared leading scorer honors with Spencer Bulthuis.
“Everyone’s locked in,” Bohlen said. “Everyone’s playing off each other. We’re playing well and we’re handling the pressure. That’s how we get it done every game.”
Unlike Wednesday’s win over Holly, which saw the Eagles go cold from outside the 3-point arc, Hartland hit for six 3s in the first half, three in each quarter.
“It’s how it rolls,” Grundman said. “Some days you’re on, some days you’re off, but you have to figure it out on the defensive end. You keep shooting because now you have confidence in your shot.”
Grundman, meanwhile, was dedicated to covering Howell’s Danny Honkala. He went scoreless, but was up to the task on defense, forcing Honkala to work for his shots on a night when his shot wasn’t falling as it did against Linden, when he had 20 points.
“Hartland’s a good team,” Honkala said. “They have good shooters, they keyed on me and I could tell. And our shots did not fall.”
Honkala had 11 points on Friday, and Logan Leppek had a team-high 12, mostly on the inside. But the Highlanders were hampered by the absence of Adam Jones, who was injuree at the end of the first half on Wednesday and did not make the trip to Fenton, and Carter Bandemer, the erstwhile point guard who was sidelined by an ankle injury.
But Howell coach Nick Simon refused to used those absences as an explanation for his team’s loss.
“I don’t want to talk about excuses or reasons why we lost, things we can’t control,” Simon said. “We rolled with guys we were comfortable with. (Hartland) played better.
“Hartland had a great team all year, and it was a team that wasn’t on paper, guaranteed to be that good,” Simon added. (Blouin) did a phenomenal job all season of getting them to play together, to play their roles. They’re tough as nails. We knew it was going to be an uphill battle all night anyway, and we gave it our best shot — but they played a little better.”
Friday’s victory was the latest in a big week at Hartland High School, after the girls team reached the Division 1 quarterfinals with a win on Thursday about an hour after the hockey team won in a Division 2 semifinal.
“It’s fun to go to school,” Grundman said, grinning.
Then it was time to look forward, to Detroit Catholic Central, which beat Walled Lake Northern 44-34 at Walled Lake Western on Friday night.
Hartland players are off Saturday, while the coaching staff looks at film in preparation for Sunday’s practice before Monday’s game.
“A busy weekend,” Blouin said. “But these guys will be ready to roll.”
