Early deficit leads to road loss for Bulldogs

A slow start on the road against Class 4A Cody cost the Lovell Bulldogs Friday night as they fell to the Broncs 54-38.
The Bulldogs struggled early in the game and trailed 14-5 after the first quarter and 32-15 at halftime.
“I was disappointed in the way we came out,” coach Shane Durtsche said. “We weren’t ready to compete, and they were. They came out and punched us in the mouth. Honestly, that was the biggest difference.
“I told the kids at halftime our lack of aggression got us behind.”
It was opposite of last year’s game in Lovell, when the Bulldogs led Cody 29-11 at halftime in Lovell en route to a 53-50 win.
“As a 4A team they were physical and came out and were aggressive,” Durtsche said. “We were on our heels early and couldn’t dig ourselves out of that hole. We struggled. I don’t think we drew iron on our first four or five shots. I think those guys (Cody) have been waiting for us, and we didn’t answer the bell.”
The game was much more competitive in the second half as each team scored 10 points in the third quarter and Lovell edged Cody 13-12 in the fourth.
“It was a tale of two halves,” Durtsche said. “We came out with some fire (in the second half) and went toe to toe with them.”
Parker Anderson led the Bulldogs with 11 points, and Matthew Newman added 9 points, Davin Crosby 8, Owen Walker 5, Kaeson Anderson 3 and Kyle Wilson 2. Walker pulled down 10 rebounds to lead the team.
The Bulldogs shot 36 percent from the field in the game and hit just two of 15 three-point attempts and four of 11 free throws.
Tournament
in Worland
The Bulldogs will next compete in the annual Big Horn Basin Classic hosted by Worland and Thermopolis. Lovell will play Riverside at noon Friday (JVs at 10:30 a.m.) and Wyoming Indian at 6 p.m. (JVs at 4:30).
Friday’s games will determine the pairings for Saturday contests, with the two third-place teams from pool play meeting at 11 a.m., first-place teams at 12:30 p.m. and second-place teams at 2 p.m., with the tournament championship game at
4 p.m. in Thermopolis.
Durtsche said the Bulldogs will get a strong test against Wyoming Indian, which has put together another strong team in ’23-24, currently holding a 9-3 record. Powell and Thermopolis are strong teams in the Thermop gym.
“We have an outside chance to see Powell in the championship game,” Durtsche said, with the Bulldogs having to get past both Wyoming Indian and defending state champion Worland. The upside of playing a team like Cody is that, though it was a tough one coming out of the break, we played
against a good basketball team, and that should help us going forward.”