Marquette's Seth Sandstrom, center, gets down on one knee trying to block a shot by Calumet's Erik Loukus, left center No. 7, that goes just over the shoulder of Marquette goalie Cole Kelly and over the net during their high school hockey game played at Lakeview Arena in Marquette on Dec. 3. (Photo courtesy Cara Kamps)

MIDLAND — The Marquette Senior High School hockey team is making good in the MHSAA tournament after having an up-and-down regular season.

The Sentinels won their second straight game in Midland on Wednesday night, defeating the Midland Chemics 2-1 in overtime after scoring the tying goal early in the third period.

Four days earlier, MSHS was at the Midland Civic Arena for the first time in these playoffs, defeating Midland Dow 3-2 in its playoff opener.

The win over Midland wraps up the MHSAA Division 2 regional title for Marquette and sends the Sentinels to the quarterfinals against what has been reported as the state’s No. 1 Division 2 team, 22-4 Flint Powers Catholic.

That game will be played at the Saginaw Bay Ice Arena between Saginaw and Bay City at 6:45 p.m. Saturday. A win there would get MSHS to the state semifinals at the USA Hockey Arena in Plymouth for a game at 5 p.m. or 7:30 p.m. Thursday, with the state championship game at the same location at 11 a.m. next Saturday.

Other quarterfinal games will pit Traverse City Central against Grandville, Rochester Adams vs. Livonia Stevenson and Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice against Trenton.

Talking about his team’s modest 15-12 record, MSHS head coach Doug Garrow said his team has been offensively challenged.

“We’ve been fairly inconsistent this season,” he said by phone on Thursday afternoon. “We don’t score a lot, we rely on good defense and good goaltending.”

He added that the Sentinels only have five seniors, having lost 11 players from the 2023-24 team.

On Wednesday, Brody Sheldon scored the game winner with about 5:50 left in the eight-minute first OT period, according to Garrow. Assists were credited to Seth Sandstrom and Jack Pond.

“It started as a broken play,” Garrow said, adding that Pond chipped the puck past a Midland defenseman in his own zone before Sheldon took off down ice on a 2-on-1 with Sandstrom. Sheldon was then reported to have passed the puck to Sandstrom near the blueline, while Sandstrom got it back to Sheldon right in front of the goalmouth for the tap in.

The Chemics, who finished their season at 14-11-1, opened the scoring about five minutes into the game, taking a faceoff in Marquette’s end, quickly shooting and then knocking in the rebound past MSHS goaltender Cole Kelly, who finished with 19 saves.

“We dominated them after that,” Garrow said, illustrating it with his team’s 45-20 overall advantage in shots on goal.

But Midland kept its lead for a long time until Sandstrom was able to tie it with about 14:30 left in regulation on a power play goal assisted by Easton Bal and Brody Lemire.

Garrow recounted that Lamire was at the blueline and passed the puck along the sidewall to Bal, who made a cross-ice pass to Sandstrom as the latter knocked the puck in over the Midland goalie’s glove.

Steve Brownlee can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 552. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.