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BUFFALO - The Worland Warriors basketball team got their season underway at the East-West Classic in Buffalo at Buffalo High School on Friday. Matching up against the Douglas Bearcats the Warriors fell to their former 3A East rivals, 67-64, to start the season 0-1.

"We felt that it was mostly on us. We didn't do a good job of executing and, defensively, we aren't very good right now," said WHS boys basketball coach Aaron Abel. "Our guys were playing defense as individuals and not playing as a team. Our communication has to get better on the floor and we have to be better at defending screens, especially ball-screens and dribble handoffs. Douglas definitely took advantage of us in those areas throughout those games.

"You could see us learning our lessons as the game progressed. We were better at defending those actions in the fourth quarter. But in the first three quarters I think our guys thought it would be easier than it was."

What hurt the Warriors the most in their loss to Douglas was one quarter, specifically the third quarter in which they were outscored 30-6 by the Bearcats. Going into the half Worland held a 36-26 advantage but after the third, were trailing 56-42.

The Warriors were able to cut into the Bearcat lead in the fourth quarter and even had a chance to tie things up in with 30 seconds remaining, trailing 65-62, but a turnover spoiled those chances.

"We also got into foul trouble with Luke [Mortimer] and Rylan [Mocko] and when those guys had to go off the floor in the third quarter, our bench did a bad job of communicating and we left their best player open and he buried three 3s right in a row. If you point to the reason why we lost it was the way we came out of the locker room in the third quarter, we gave them a quick 9-0 run and quickly wiped away a 10-point lead.

"Then we're up two and had to sub Luke out with his fourth foul, and immediately we gave up another three 3-pointers to Tait Larson and that turned a two-point lead into a seven-point deficit. I don't know if I've ever seen a team fall apart in a quarter the way we did there," said Abel. "I think it was a good learning lesson for our boys and something we'll get better at. We're going to play two teams that are even better than Douglas and as long as we take care of the things we didn't do right against Douglas, we'll be in a better position."

As poorly as the third quarter went the Abel thinks it was a very important lesson for his bench players and starters.

"It was a good learning lesson for everyone, the guys on the court and the bench. Luke took a poor foul 15-feet from the rim, for his third foul and a poor charging foul, for his second foul. So when he commits the fourth foul, which was a necessary foul to stop a layup, if that was his second or first, that's one thing," said Abel. "But he learned a lesson, Rylan learned the importance of closeouts and how those resulted in his fourth and fifth fouls. I think the whole team learned lots of important individual lessons that will make us better."

The Warriors are back in action today with games against Pinedale at 8 a.m. and Lander at 5:30 p.m. Both teams figure to be a tougher challenge than Douglas and Worland will have to correct their errors from Friday.

"This weekend is about our five defense non-negotiables," said Abel. "We've got to take away fast break layups, we did a decent job of that. We have to take away baseline and straight-line drives, those two things there cost us with some closeouts at times. We have to keep the ball out of the post area and we were really bad at that today. And we have to hold our opponents to one shot. Those are the five things that are absolutes, we were good at two of the five today and as always we're always going to look improve in that area."

Added Abel about Pinedale, "They're a very athletic, strong looking team. They're very talented and we're going to have to have the mindset of taking away their post entries and not letting them get the ball under the rim so easily."