The Marquette boys basketball team accepts the Miners Cup trophy from Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrest, back center, after the Sentinels defeated Negaunee at the Barb Crill Gymnasium in Marquette on Friday, Feb. 14, 2025. (Photo courtesy Cara Kamps)

MARQUETTE — A pair of area girls teams made moves, one into and the other out of, the top five teams in weekly high school basketball polls conducted by the Upper Peninsula Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association.

The Ishpeming girls were the big winner, re-entering the Divisions 1-3 rankings at No. 5 after being absent from there for several weeks.

The Hematites improved to 13-5 with three wins last week that emphatically put an end to a two-game losing streak that helped cost them their U.P. top-five spot.

Ishpeming edged Division 4 top-five Baraga 43-40 in overtime on Monday, then dropped Escanaba 78-46 Thursday and Division 4 top-five Munising 52-45 on Friday.

Even the two-game losing streak was nothing to scoff at, considering it came against the top two teams in the D 1-3 poll, Gladstone and Negaunee.

Leaving the top five was L’Anse, which still is receiving two votes to make the “other receiving votes” purgatory.

The Purple Hornets (13-4), who actually improved to 14-4 after winning at Jeffers 62-53 on Monday, lost a pair of games last week, falling at Lake Linden-Hubbell 74-73 and slipping against D-4 No. 2 Ewen-Trout Creek 61-37.

LL-H is unranked, but like L’Anse, received two votes in D-4 to get on that poll’s waiting list.

The other half-dozen area teams making top-five lists all were unmoved from last week.

Two are at the top and unanimous to boot.

At the summit of Divisions 1-3 girls, Negaunee improved to 19-0 after convincing wins last week. The Miners downed Gwinn 60-34 at home, then took out Marquette 48-22 at the Sentinels’ gym.

Like the Miners’ girls, none of the UPSSA voters could resist ranking the Marquette boys No. 1 in Divisions 1-3.

That’s because these Sentinels are 18-2 and have won 17 in a row. After a Feb. 8 win over Division 1 state-ranked Detroit Cass Tech at neutral-site Traverse City, MSHS won three more games last week.

Marquette powered past Houghton 98-50, drubbed Escanaba 85-51 and eased past Negaunee 78-64 to clinch the Miners Cup trophy.

Also in boys Divisions 1-3, Westwood (16-5) remained at No. 4, while Munising (18-2) stayed No. 5.

The Patriots, who are actually 17-5 after Monday’s 67-43 Senior Night win over Gladstone, won twice last week, beating Gwinn 63-33 and Calumet 76-31.

The Mustangs really took care of business last week, posting a trio of road victories each by at least 20 points. Munising downed Manistique 69-41, Rapid River 60-39 and Superior Central 64-14.

For the girls in Division 4, Munising (15-3) remained third and Baraga (13-5) fourth.

You may notice that the Munising boys are in Divisions 1-3, specifically Division 3, but Division 4 for the girls. That’s due to the MHSAA’s slight differences in enrollment cutoffs between boys and girls basketball.

The Mustangs girls lost two out of three games last week, and while it didn’t hurt their position in the U.P. rankings, it did cost them their first-place vote they had been receiving for several weeks.

Munising fell at Marquette 58-53, downed SC 61-12 and lost to Ishpeming 52-45.

Baraga split its games last week, losing to Ishpeming 43-40 in OT while felling Dollar Bay 45-16.

In the Associated Press rankings from last week — this week wouldn’t be available until after The Mining Journal’s deadline on Tuesday evening — the Negaunee girls improved a spot to No. 3 in Division 2 after former No. 3 Frankenmuth slid down four spots.

The Miners earned 58 polling points, trailing only unanimous No. 1 Ann Arbor Gabriel Richard (16-1) and No. 2 Tecumseh (15-1). In that same poll, Gladstone was 16th with seven points.

Also for the girls, St. Ignace remained No. 1 in Division 4 even while the Saints received fewer first-place votes than No. 2 Kingston, the team Ishpeming knocked off in last spring’s state championship game.

E-TC is sixth, also receiving the same single first-place vote as St. Ignace, while Munising is ninth.

Baraga slipped out of the top 10 to 13th with seven votes, while LL-H is tied for 14th with six.

On the boys side of the AP polls, Marquette just missed the top 10 in Division 1, coming in 11th with 13 votes, nine votes shy of 10th-place Grand Rapids Northview.

Cass Tech, the Detroit school the Sentinels knocked off several weeks ago, fell from seventh to ninth in D-1.

In Division 2, Kingsford is 14th with seven votes, while in Division 3, Iron Mountain is seventh.

Division 4 includes Forest Park second with two of the five first-place votes, while Pickford was in a three-way tie for eighth and Norway 11th.