East Lansing — Goodrich achieved perfection, again, on Saturday evening at Breslin Center.
On top of unseating defending Division 2 girls basketball champion Tecumseh, 55-44, behind smothering defense and a 3-point barrage, Goodrich capped the 2025-26 season with a perfect record to go with a state championship.
“Couldn’t be more proud of these girls for achieving what they did,” Gray said. “And like I said, the way we played tonight was the way we play — that makes it even sweeter.”
BOX SCORE: Goodrich 55, Tecumseh 44
It’s the first state title for Goodrich (29-0) since back-to-back titles in 2012 and 2013, all won by Gray. It’s the second time Goodrich has gone undefeated, as the 2012 team went 28-0. Goodrich is the first team in Michigan girls high school basketball history to win 29 games.
Goodrich got a game-high 21 points from senior guard Kayla Hairston, who finished 3-of-3 from deep, plus 14 from junior Baylor Lauinger. Tecumseh (26-3) ends the 2025-26 campaign one game short of repeating as Division 2 champion.
It’s also a dose of revenge for Goodrich, which beat Tecumseh after getting knocked out of the tournament last season by the same foe.
“It’s definitely special,” Gray said. “And coming out and getting this one to get today against Tecumseh is big, because we lost to him last year, thinking we could win it all last year. But coming out and winning today feels even better, because we got it done.”
The first half turned into a defensive bloodbath for Goodrich, which produced 10 steals as Tecumseh turned it over a total of 14 times. Three Goodrich players came up with a trio of steals: Kat Federick, Baylor Lauinger and Kaylee Eickhoff.
Lauinger and Federick finished with four turnovers by game’s end.
“We just take so much pride in our defense,” Lauinger said. “We work at it, work at it, work at it. And especially the two off the bench, they come off and they just bring defense for us. And our defense builds our offense.”
And along with a defensive effort that created a massive possession disparity — Goodrich turned it over five times in the first half — the Tecumseh offense struggled to find clean, close looks.
Tecumseh finished 6-of-6 from the field, averaging just one shot for every minute of play in the first half.
“I mean, you give up 15 points off turnovers,” Tecumseh head coach Kristy Zajac said, “that’s hard, that’s hard to come back from.”
And as Tecumseh lurched to 14 first half points through a maelstrom of Goodrich defenders, the turnovers turned into easy, distributed offense for Goodrich.
After the first half, Kayla Hairston led Goodrich with 10 points, and Federick and Lauinger each added seven, good for 24 of the 29 for their team. Hairston was a perfect 2-for-2 from behind the arc in the first half.
Tecumseh stabilized the game in the third quarter, scoring as many points as it had in the first half. It also protected the ball, with just three turnovers after 14 across the first half. But for all that Tecumseh did right in the third quarter, it only won the frame 14-12, and cut a 15-point margin to 13.
It could’ve been closer, as Tecumseh had outscored Goodrich 14-9, poised to cut the lead to 10 heading into the final frame.
But Goodrich’s Tanner Schramm hoisted a corner 3-pointer just in front of her bench with a second remaining, causing an eruption from the Goodrich fans and deflating the Tecumseh comeback as the shot fell at the buzzer.
“It felt great,” Schramm said. “They all stood up and started pushing me and shoved me. It felt great. I love doing it with this team because they all have each other’s backs and they like to see each other win.”
Goodrich finished the game shooting 9-of-17 on 3-pointers, better than 50%, and shot nearly as well overall from the field.
While Tecumseh had ironed out the crippling issues that led to a 22-11 margin in the second quarter, it still couldn’t slow down the Goodrich offense, especially from deep.
So while Tecumseh managed to even the score and even outscore Goodrich by a slight margin in the second half, the damage was done and the defending champs had dug too big a hole.
And with fewer than 30 seconds to play, Gray gave the seniors a curtain call for the fans, as the time to celebrate perfection had come.
Andrew Graham is a freelance writer.
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Goodrich caps perfect season with Division 2 title, dose of revenge
Reporting by Andrew Graham, Special to The Detroit News / The Detroit News
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