Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Springfield’s Olivia Milbrath (13) dribbles past Gibbon-Fairfax-Winthrop’s Kelby Bruns, back-right, towards the hoop during a Tomahawk Division girls basketball game on Monday at Springfield High School.

SPRINGFIELD — For two teams that have relied on their upperclassmen to stand out and lead the way this season, Springfield and Gibbon-Fairfax-Winthrop both saw its younger varsity players shine on Monday night.

It was the Tigers putting it all together in the end, however, as they held off GFW for a 62-54 win in a Tomahawk-Valley-Conference, Tomahawk Division girls basketball game.

Springfield (13-7, 9-5) was led by freshman Kendall Krueger, who had 15 points, while sophomore Olivia Milbrath added 13 points and nine rebounds.

“They’re definitely starting to look to score more now,” Springfield head coach Mike Kelly said of Krueger and Milbrath. “They’ve gotten more physical as we’ve gone along. They’re starting to gain more and more confidence and hopefully they’ll keep gaining confidence and get good experience here ready for the playoffs because it’s not very far away.”

For GFW (4-15, 2-10), freshmen Kinley Bruns and Kelly Willegal each had 12 points.

After Emma Hauger hit a 3 and a jumper to put the Tigers up 39-26 early in the second half, the Thunderbirds got a 3 each from junior Taylor Bauer and Bruns to trail 39-32. Hauger hit another 3 to put the Tigers up double digits again, but the Thunderbirds got 3s from Bruns and Willegal and a drive inside from Bauer to make it a 42-40 game and force a Springfield timeout with 10:31 left to play. Out of the timeout, Willegal buried a corner 3 to give GFW a 43-42 lead, its first lead of the night since being up 4-3.

The lead was short-lived as Krueger hit a jumper to put Springfield back in front, but the Thunderbirds hung around and battled back from a late 7-point deficit to trail 55-54 after Bruns banked in a 3. Milbrath and freshman Makay Winkelmann hit back-to-back buckets to put Springfield up 59-54 and force a GFW timeout with 1:28 left to play.

Krueger then got a steal out of the timeout and a bucket on the other end and another late GFW turnover and steal by Milbrath ended up allowing the Tigers to chew more clock and ultimately finish with an extra free throw by Krueger to put things away.

Monday’s game showed the Tigers, who defeated GFW 57-34 in Winthrop on Jan. 3, a different side they didn’t see out of GFW in their previous meeting.

“I think the last game, there were four people who each had a 3, but tonight those two [Bruns and Willegal], they were lighting it up,” Kelly said. “Defensively they held us in check for quite a bit of it, but it was a good game.”

While the underclassmen took center stage, especially in the second half, that didn’t mean either team was without veteran leadership.

Jasmine Novotny and Hauger, both seniors leaders for the Tigers, finished with 13 and 10 points, respectively.

Bauer finished with 12 points for GFW, while senior Nicole Duehn ended with 10 points.

GFW head coach Rich Busse said his veterans helped set the stage for his younger players.

“We understand we’re in the middle of a process,” Busse said. “I think you saw some of our older kids make smarter decisions and our younger kids cash them in. Our point guard [Kinley Bruns] has struggled controlling the ball, and I think she played one of her best games of the year. Kelly Willegal was ready to make shots and when they found her, she stuck them for us. It’s a matter of taking what we talk about in timeouts and at halftime making some adjustments and actually applying it out here and making it work. I think that’s what we saw in the second half.

“We gained a lot of confidence tonight in a number of areas of our game. And I’ll mention Keyden Buboltz, too. I don’t know what her stat line was, but off the top of my head I can remember five really strong, aggressive rebounds from her and that matters. Those are not second chances for the other team. Kids grew.”

After a pair of free throws by GFW’s Kora Schwarzrock had her team down 9-7, the Tigers got a 15-2 run to lead 23-9 in the first half. A late 3 by Bruns had GFW down 29-22, but Krueger hit a pair of free throws with less than 15 seconds left in the half to give the Tigers a 31-22 halftime advantage.

While the Thunderbirds had a nice comeback in the second half, Busse said they haven’t had too many games like this so far this season.

“We’ve had two now lately where it’s been a possession ball game with three minutes to play,” Busse said. “We lost to Loyola by 3 and we lost this one by 8. You need those games to learn how to play in those games and we haven’t had a ton of them. Coming down the stretch, one timeout, how are we going to navigate three minutes of basketball? There are other places we can grow, that’s one of them.”

Springfield is at BOLD on Tuesday night, while GFW hosts Sleepy Eye on Thursday.