Warriors fall to No. 4 Rawlins 66-37

WORLAND -Friday night's game against No. 4 Rawlins started out very promising for the Worland Warriors basketball team. The Warriors were able to execute their game plan against one of 3A's tallest teams for most of the first quarter, and if not for a few bad bounces could have held the lead at the end of the first quarter. Instead, the Warriors trailed the Outlaws 11-10.

The Warriors continued to battle for most of the second quarter and with 3:26 left in the second quarter Rawlins called a timeout. The Outlaws then proceeded to go on a 9-3 run to go into halftime with a 30-18 lead and from then on the Warriors struggled to replicate their first quarter results.

WHS boys basketball coach Aaron Abel said, "I thought we played really well for 13-14 minutes. We were executing really well on both ends of the floor. We were forcing missed shots and that was great, but we told our guys none of that matters if you don't finish the stop. You have to finish the stop with a rebound, we have to rebound really angry and physically or find a way to get a fingertip on the ball to keep it alive and create a 50/50 ball.

"I felt the way we played on both ends of the floor, instead of being down eight or 10, we should have been up 10. We got great shots, missed quite a few 3's and layups that we normally don't miss. We had great possessions on one end and execution on the defensive end, we just couldn't finish those with stops."

Added Abel, "At the end of the second quarter some of our execution started to go away, especially on the defensive end, and they [Rawlins] went on a run there. At the end of the second, start of third they went on a big run that put the game away essentially."

While Rawlins continued rolling in the third quarter, Abel looked for a lineup to shake things up to which he found in Andrew Edholm, Rylan Mocko, Luke Mortimer, Rudy Sanford and Wyatt Wyman. The younger Warrior lineup made a quick dent in the Rawlins lead at 41-26.

"We went with our starting lineup to start the second half but when they went on that big run we decided to go with our younger lineup that worked well against Rocky Mountain, and Thermopolis last night. We were able to make a run and cut it to 15 at one point and called a good timeout to get resituated there and we weren't able to do much after that," said Abel.

The younger Warriors lineup wasn't able to bring Worland all the way back but they did show that they can be placed into tough situations and perform. Now they just need to improve their communication to keep a consistent flow between starters and reserves.

"The important thing is a lot of guys earned some trust tonight and played well in the JV game and earned some minutes in the varsity game, that was a positive," said Abel. "It feels like our guys are really struggling to communicate on the court. When we sub and when we switch in and out of our press that's causing big problems for us defensively."

With the weekend off the Warriors will rest up as next week's practice will be a physical one as they prepare for the No. 1-ranked Buffalo Bison on Friday and Powell Panthers Saturday.

"Monday's practice we have to be more physical. We're going to take the weekend and rest then on Monday it's gotta be about doing drills that will get us talking and will help us with contact under the basket, some Tom Izzo rebounding stuff," said Abel.