WORLAND - The 14U Worland Wildfires start their final tournament of the 2017 season today, competing in the Wyoming Girls State Fastpitch Tournament in Rock Springs.

The Wildfires will compete in the 14U recreation division and begin with pool play today, then Saturday start the double-elimination bracket portion of the tournament.

On the season the Wildfires finished with a 10-17 record, going 7-3 in their Riverton/Lander city league.

June 24-25 the Wildfires played in their final regular season tournament at the Douglas Invite. The tournament would also be the final time this season the Wildfires would compete at the 16U level. Worland dropped their three pool games as well as their bracket game in the single-elimination bracket, but were highly competitive in each of the four games.

"The Douglas tournament was evenly matched by all the teams involved," said Worland Wildfires coach Dave Coronado. "Every game by the Wildfires was within reach of victory."

The Wildfires lost to the Casper Cobras, 7-2, the Cody Pride, 7-3, Lander 5-2 and the Cobras again, 8-7.

The leading bats this season were Kylee Fronk (.521), Zoe Fernandez (.511), Vivian Mosbroker (.500) and Emily Stoermer (.464). Carmyn Buckman, Fronk and Stoermer also had one home run apiece this season. The leading arms for the Wildfires were Brooke Hellyer with six wins, Fernandez and Rylee Wagner with two wins each.

As a team the Wildfires allowed 220 runs this season while scoring 178 of their own.

Playing against older and more experienced teams led to some of the team's struggles this season. Nevertheless, the Wildfires improved with each tournament and game and it is because of this that Coronado believes his team can come away with some hardware on Saturday.

"The girls have a real good chance of playing for a championship should their defense come through. The girls game experience against 18 U and 16 U has helped them see what it takes to win. They are ready to play for a title and have worked hard on improving their individual games to achieve the team goal they set since placing third at last year's state tournament," said Coronado.