Dogies struggle in season opener

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
 
Someone forgot to take the lid off the bucket in the Dogies’ season opener last Friday night when the Custer Wildcats came to town for the annual border war. Usually a pretty efficient offensive team, Newcastle shooters struggled to find the bottom of the net throughout the game.
Initially, it appeared that both teams seemed to be experiencing some early season jitters, as the game remained scoreless for the first four minutes until Custer broke the seal with the first basket of the game. 
“You know, most of our scoring troubles fall back on our shoulders,” head coach Allen Von Eye admitted. “We didn’t execute very well, and I was a bit disappointed because we never got into our rhythm all 32 minutes of the game.”
At the end of the first quarter, the Dogies held a 7-4 lead, all coming from the team’s leading scorer Cade Ostenson. Unfortunately, the offensive woes continued for the home team into the second frame as they held at seven for the first five minutes while the Wildcats went on a 13-6 run to go into the half with a 17-13 lead. 
“We were doing some very uncharacteristic things as far as our spacing goes on offense. We’re usually very solid, but I guess when it’s the first game of the season all of that goes out the window,” Von Eye speculated. “We were getting some good looks and some wide-open shots, but when those aren’t falling it just compounds the issue and we start to press.”
The Dogies were able to make up ground as the second half got underway, and by the midway mark of the third quarter, had tied the contest at 19. 
Though Newcastle put forth a good effort on defense for most of the night, a couple of let downs at the end of the third quarter and a couple of minutes in the fourth gave Custer the edge they needed to get the better of the home team and take the 44-40 win. 
“You know, we forced some very difficult, contested shots that unfortunately went long off the glass back into their hands,” Von Eye sighed. “Compounding the problem was their bigs, who not only had several inches on our guys, but also had significant size that they were able to use to push us under the net despite our guys getting decent box-outs on them.”
What fans didn’t see much on Friday night, was a great deal of full court pressure from the Dogies. Von Eye
 opted not to apply pressure early due to being short-handed on his bench. However he admitted that, in hind-sight, a little more pressure may have been the way to go.
“We would have loved to pressure more, but we’re pretty thin right now, and I was pretty concerned with our bench minutes,” he sighed. “We are at our best when we’re playing freely, but I didn’t want to risk getting our best players in foul trouble and sitting on the bench. It was a good learning experience for us, however.”
Ostenson and Dylon Tidyman began to find their stroke in the final minutes of the fourth quarter, but it was a little too late to make up the deficit.
Ostenson led the team in scoring with 16 points on the night, while Tidyman contributed 11 of his own. Dylan Talley and Gavin Roady added four points each, Sawyer Roberson hit a three from the corner at the buzzer for his points and Peyton Tystad rounded out the scoring with two points. 
Reflecting on the loss, Von Eye pointed out that had his team shot five to seven percent better than they did, the outcome of the contest would have been reversed. Though disappointed with the outcome, he went on to state that it was a good learning experience for his squad and that they would be working hard to address the issues as they prepare for the Stateline Shootout this weekend.
The tournament tips off on Thursday as the Dogies travel to Sundance to take on the Bulldogs beginning at 7:00. The team will be in Belle Fourche on Friday to take on the Lead Golddiggers at 4:00 p.m. and will close out the tournament on Saturday against Belle on their home court at 3:30 p.m.