Dogies suffer shell-shock

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
 
Dogie hoops head coach Allen Von Eye admitted that Friday was not one of his squad’s finer moments across the board. The Dogies finished the contest against the Broncs in Burns with a 27-55 loss which may have reflected a better game than his team actually played.
“It’s disappointing because we had such a good week of practice,” Von Eye insisted. “It was actually our best week of practice, collectively, of the whole year.”
“Our energy level, our competition level and everything really was great and we knew exactly what we were going to see when we got on the court on Friday,” he continued.  “I told the guys that I could have stomached it if we hadn’t been prepared or if they did something we didn’t expect when we got into the game, but that just wasn’t the case.”
The Dogies had spent the week preparing to attack the zone, and Von Eye insisted they were confident heading into the contest against the Broncs. However, when they hit the floor, the guys stopped doing everything that they had been working on all week.
“It was mind boggling for us and for the kids,” he exclaimed. “They knew they weren’t doing what they needed to do. We were hesitant to attack the middle which was wide open in their zone, and we settled back on passing the ball around the perimeter instead.”
Early, Zach Purviance hit three from the outside right away in the contest which may have contributed to his team resorting to playing the perimeter game. However, those three would be the only ones to connect from beyond the arc on the night.
“Those shots by Zach kept us going, but
they almost cooked our goose as well,” Von Eye admitted. “After that, we kind of just kept doing that hoping we could get more to fall and we couldn’t.”
The Dogies battled with the Broncs for the first portion of the first quarter and then Burns went on a run and got out to an 11-point lead by the end of it. The second quarter was all Burns as they outscored the Dogies 18-4 to take a 40-15 lead into the locker room.
“We got very few shots up, we turned the ball over a considerable amount even in the half court against the zone,” Von Eye sighed. “We didn’t rebound well, and it was just one of those games where you look and wonder what team is out on the court, because it wasn’t the team we’ve been seeing the last few weeks. It was like they were shell shocked.”
Defensively, the Dogies took the first half to get started, however after falling to a 25-point deficit, the Broncs were only able to outscore them 15-12 in the third and fourth quarters.
“The second half was pretty defensive, but when you give up 40 points to a team that is
really not very solid, you’re putting yourself in a tough situation,” Von Eye frowned. “The kids were frustrated, too, because they saw everything they had worked so hard on all week go right out the window.” 
Only four Dogies ended up in the scoring column with Purviance leading the way with 19 points. After him was Quint Perino with four, while Gavin Gray and Hayden Overman each added two points each.
Thursday the squad has another long trip over the mountain to Thermopolis and it’s a pretty important contest for the Dogies. 
“The Bobcats are playing some pretty solid basketball right now and this game matters,” Von Eye declared. “We have to apply what we’re doing in practice in the game, because we need to get this win.”
Currently, the Dogies have a one game advantage over Thermopolis in the Northeast Quadrant standings, and in order to maintain the three seed for the upcoming Regional Tournament, Newcastle needs to get a second win against them.
Then Saturday is a rematch in Buffalo against the Bison who are currently undefeated in the quadrant and playing solid basketball right now.
The varsity is scheduled to play at 6 p.m. on Thursday and 4 p.m. on Saturday.