Broncos split in weekend openers

Friday’s battle with Columbia-Burbank ended on a positive note as the LRS Broncos opened their basketball season with a win, 41-38.

The jubilation ended there when a scrappy Warden team dismantled the Broncos on Saturday 55-40 with a dominate second half effort powered by perimeter shooting and three-point buckets.

“It was disappointing going in there and losing like that,” said head coach Dustan Arlt.

A specific set of final numbers left him astounded. The Broncos’ collective shooting percentage was 23.5 after the team converted 13 of 55 attempts from the field.

The Broncos expected Warden to open with a zone defense. That didn’t happen. Instead LRS was fighting against a man-to-man defense in the first half, and doing so well enough to stay with Warden. The first quarter ended with Warden up 13-11. The Broncos turned the tempo in the second quarter with a 10-5 effort for an intermission lead 21-18.

Arlt had the Broncos deploy the full court press in the second quarter to give them an edge. Ultimately that helped them gain a lead.

He went with it again in the third quarter expecting positive results. Warden wasn’t phased by the Broncos in the third quarter, lighting up the scoreboard with three point shots, four in a row to put them in the driver seat.

They outscored the Broncos 20-9 in the third. The fourth period was more of the same as Warden went on a 17-10 effort in the final stanza.

The Broncos never found their rhythm in the game. Arlt said the team needs to improve its shot selection. They hit six of 30 attempts from inside the three-point line. They made good seven of 25 times from behind the three-point boundary.

Point guard Dylan Hartz led the team with 13 points, four assists, two steals and ten rebounds. He also had seven of the team’s 10 turnovers.

Jake Dewald had 10 points. Drew Hartz contributed seven points and two steals. Connor O’Neill scored four and Colby Starring three. Chris Steinmetz added two points and Bryson O’Neill had one.

Palmer Phillips and Tyler Frederick each had two steals.

Friday’s opening game battle with Columbia-Burbank started out fast as the Broncos took an early lead 15-8 at the end of the first quarter. Things slowed down for both teams in the middle of the contest.

At halftime Lind-Ritzville/Sprague held an 18-15 lead as both teams scored in single digits.

The low scoring carried on in the third quarter with LRS holding an edge with a 5-3 scoring effort between the two teams.

The fourth quarter was a completely different story as both teams had a sense of urgency. Columbia-Burbank won the quarter battle 20-18 but lost the game, 41-38.

Arlt said the team looked good during the first six minutes of the game. After that a shortened practice routine due to football playoffs began to show.

“It was a little bit of a struggle,” he said.

Dylan Hartz led the team with 10 points, four assists and four rebounds despite feeling under the weather.

Starring kicked in nine points while Bryson scored seven. Drew Hartz finished with six points and nine rebounds. Connor O’Neill had five points, two assists and two blocks.

The team gave up just 13 turnovers.

“Fortunately we played good defense,” Arlt said. “Columbia-Burbank used four guards and a forward. That was tough to defend.”

The Broncos often rely on the full court press to keep them in games. Arlt would like the team’s man-to-man defense to be more productive. Against more talented teams, he said the press doesn’t work as well.

“We haven’t been really great at it in the past,” he said. “We’re working on it a lot in practice.”