By Kristin Carpenter, Mountain Valley News staff
When the Cedaredge Bruins took the court against the Rifle Bears on Friday night, they came out scoring, but familiar foes sprang up and they were unable to hold on and lost a close one, 69-63.
In the first quarter everything seemed to come together and they outscored the Bears by nine points, but in the second and third quarters the scoring fell off and they allowed Rifle to inch back into the game, and in the fourth quarter could not pull it out.
“It was a accumulation of turnovers. We have to knuckle down and take care of the basketball and be smart. It is normal to have a few here and there, but we allowed four in a row at one point and that’s what got Rifle back in it,” Coach Dunbar said.
Heading into another league clash with the Titans of Coal Ridge on Saturday, the Bruins fell behind after the first, but kept themselves in it with a quarter surge and were ahead by one point at the half time buzzer.
“Going into the game we were working on taking care of the basketball, but again turnovers got us, that’s something we are working on. You have to limit turnovers to 12-15 and then you can win the game,” Dunbar said.
After the break, the lead slipped away. Down 42-35 with most of the period left, Luke Wieben flew in and hit a big two points to pull within five. Strong defense from Miguel Barajas and more pinpoint shooting from Wieben kept the team close, pulling them to within three points.
Drew Beach checked into the game for Barajas with 2:55 left in the third, and the crowd got involved, the sixth man was in the game, but despite the support and the fast paced back and forth the game had in the final minutes of the third quarter, the Titans pulled away and extended their lead to 14 points.
“They played good, and worked hard. We just have to put it all together in the second half like we do in the first half,” Dunbar said.
Down by 20 points with 5:39 left in the game, Cade Wasser took the line and made on of his shots. Wieben and Beach both tried to follow it up with points of their own, but could not score points at that time in the game, but Dunbar was happy with the leadership.
“He always plays hard. It’s the love of the game, he does what we ask him and he leads by action. He is a leader on this team,” he said of Wieben’s tenacity.
Halfway through the final period the home team had only scored four points but allowed 12, when Beach got a big rebound to Kyle Ward and the scoring started up again, and they pulled to within 17 points by the buzzer, but that is where it ended.
The team will head to Basalt on Friday. With the two losses last weekend they move to 3-11 overall and have yet to record a league win.
