Warriors close out weekend with two wins

Big Horn Basin Classic Friday games: Worland vs. St. Stephens 1:30 p.m.; Worland vs. Rocky Mountain 7:30 p.m.

After opening last week with two losses, the Worland Warriors basketball team closed out the week with two victories.

The Warriors lost their home opener to 4A Cody on Jan. 4, 45-41, and lost the opening game at the Winter Classic in Pinedale on Jan. 5 vs. Lander Valley, 55-49. But the team rallied and closed the week with wins over Lyman 48-45 and Pinedale 62-59 on Jan. 6.

WEEKEND

"The Pinedale game was a good game for us offensively," said WHS boys basketball coach Aaron Abel. "Anytime we can get perimeter shots from guys outside of Bryan [Caballero] and Tyshon [Swalstad] is good for us. We got some 3s from Owen, Brody and Fisher Martinez and when we get other guys to hit shots like that for us, it makes things easier."

Abel continued, "Defensively against Pinedale, there were some things we could have done better. We gave up four straight offensive rebounds, three of them off free throws. That was frustrating and cost us the lead at the half. We struggled to deny their leading scorers. Josh Gozar, their lead scorer, still had 20 against us. We put a committee on him led by Brody [Thiel], Bryan and Masen Decker. Masen did a pretty good job on him, but we still struggled to deny him catches. That was something we were pretty good at last year, shutting down the other team's top-scoring option."

Pinedale's only loss on the weekend was to Worland. The Wranglers beat No. 5 Buffalo and No. 3 Thermopolis last week.

"All in all, we played that Pinedale game with a ton of energy. Maintaining our energy and effort is something we have to do for us to win games. All seven of our games have been decided by 10 or less. We know we're going to be in a dogfight, and we have to find a way to win it. We have to continue to make the plays that help us win those games," said Abel.

Against Cody, it was game four of the season for Worland. The team is still learning their identity, and the players are getting comfortable with their roles.

That showed against Cody, but to the Warriors credit they kept battling. Even when Cody went on a run in the third, which Abel said was on him, the Warriors didn't let up. Whether it was a big offensive rebound or getting stop and score, the team didn't relent.

"We're still settling into our roles offensively. By the end of the weekend, things had sort of corrected itself. We needed other guys to step up and be scorers for this team. By the end of the weekend, Owen had 22 against Lyman, we need him to score the basketball. We need Bryan to score the basketball for us. We need multiple threats.

"I told the guys that the Cody loss is probably on me. I should have used timeouts in that third quarter but sat on them because I knew it would be close and wanted to save them for the fourth quarter. At the same time, I told them it's valuable to me to see them play through another team's run. To try and fix it on the floor and develop that court leadership. In hindsight, I should have used a timeout when Cody made a run to start the quarter and had that run at the end of the quarter.

One of the bigger learning points from last week for Worland was the energy they bring to a game. It's non-negotiable. If the Warriors want to win games this season, playing with high energy is a must.

"I was really proud of the energy the guys brought against Cody and most of the weekend. This team is as hard of a working team as I've ever coached. They absolutely work really, really hard. They also saw what happens when they don't play with that energy in that Friday game. It was frustrating but good at the same time. We took a step forward overall this weekend, and that was good," said Abel.

As one of the host sites for the boys side of the Big Horn Basin Classic this weekend. Friday is pool play, with bracket play kicking in on Saturday.

The Warriors are in a pool with 2A St. Stephens and 2A Rocky Mountain, playing St. Stephens at 1:30 p.m. and Rocky Mountain at 7:30 p.m.

The goals for Worland this week include finishing better around the rim and improving on ball-screen defense.

"From a skill standpoint, we need to finish around the rim better. In the Cody game, we left a lot of points off the scoreboard. That was kind of the case all weekend long. We're getting the ball into the paint successfully which is what we want, but just had a lot of missed layups. We're working a lot on finishing around the rim and finishing under pressure. Hopefully, we see some marked improvement on that.

"We're working hard on our ball-screen defense. Defending ball screens is something we struggled with, especially against Lyman. We want to get more comfortable playing with each other. We've got some interruptions to practice, and we're pairing the guys who play on the floor together in our teams this week. We're getting them into a lot of 3-on-3 and 5-on-5 situations so they can get more comfortable," said Abel.

All team rankings are from WyoPreps.com.