Dexter will try to earn a spot at the Breslin Center this weekend.
Neither team was supposed to get this far.
But one of them will be going even farther.
Dexter and Saginaw Heritage will meet Tuesday night, 7 p.m. at Davison High School in a Class A state quarterfinal game, with a berth at the Breslin Center this weekend on the line.
Dexter is trying to become the second straight Washtenaw County team to make the Class A semifinals, after Huron did it last year.
And when Dreadnaughts coach Mike Bavineau started doing his homework on the team he would have to get by to get to East Lansing, he saw a Saginaw Heritage squad that strongly resembled his own.
“We kind of joked that they’re almost a mirror image of us,” Bavineau said. “Even if you look at their sizes and who they play, they’re almost a mirror image.
Neither team has a dominating scorer -- nobody from Dexter averages in double figures, and Jayde Abenth averages 12 points per game for Heritage.
And both can score from both the inside game and the outside game.
“They have a good point guard, they have a good shooting guard, they have a good inside game,” Bavineau said. “So I think that both teams will match up very, very well.”
But what’s perhaps more alike between the two teams is their road to this matchup.
Both teams scored upsets in their respective district title games against conference foes they had been swept by in the regular season. Dexter beat Huron, a team it had lost to twice in the last month, while Heritage beat undefeated Midland Dow.
And both teams pulled of regional final upsets to make it to Tuesday’s game. Dexter sank a last-second 3-pointer to top Farmington Hills Harrison, a team two spots out of the Associated Press top 10. The Hawks beat Davison, a team it had lost to by 30 two weeks earlier.
“Dexter is kind of a surprise team because everybody expected Farmington Hills Harrison to come out of that regional,” Heritage coach Tim Conley told MLive.com. “But a lot of people probably thought we’re weren’t going to come out of our regional either.”
If the Dreadnaughts make it through Tuesday, it will likely be with more of the shutdown defesve play that has gotten them this far. In its regional semifinal against Canton, Dexter went 18 minutes without allowing a field goal. In the regional final, it allowed no field goals and only 1 point in the final 13 minutes.
“We feel like if we can defend and play well on the defensive end it will give us a chance to win any game we play,” Bavineau said.
“I think it kind of helps you get into the rhythm of the game. You don’t necessarily focus on what’s happening on the offensive end, your total concentration and focus turns to the defensive end, trying to limit the other team’s opportunities to get quality scoring chances.”
Kyle Austin covers sports for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at kyleaustin@annarbor.com or 734-623-2535. Follow him on Twitter @KAustin_AA.