Taking to the court for their first series of games since the Christmas break, the Pine Bluffs Hornets basketball squad couldn’t find their groove, falling to the Kimball Longhorns, 30-52 on Friday and the Lusk Tigers, Saturday, 26-38.
From the start, the Hornets fell behind spotting the Tigers eight points in the first quarter. The Purple and Gold rallied in the second, doubling up the Tigers four points but still behind 16-12 heading into the half.
Opening the third canto, the offense again couldn’t get the job down dropping in buckets for a meager 5 points, ceding twelve to Lusk and nabbing nine points to Lusk’s 10 in the fourth.
In the match up, the Hornets offense went 9-43 (20.9 percent) on field goals; 2-15 (13.3 percent) from the three-point line and were 6-17 (35.3 percent) on free throws.
Hornets junior Blayne Gilbert lead the scoring with eight points while nabbing four rebounds and a steal. Tanner Eastman hit the net for five points, two rebounds and three steals. Ryan May, Austin Lang, Eryn Smith, and Harley Dalton each nailed three points with May adding four rebounds and two steals, Lang with four rebounds and two steals, Smith and Dalton each had three rebounds. Rounding out the games scoring was senior Chris Gorman with a point and three rebounds and Nolan Jeffres added three rebounds to the team’s totals.
Stats for the Kimball game were not available at press time.
Up next for the Hornets, they square off against the Pawnee Coyotes in Grover with varsity taking the court at 6 p.m. on Friday and host Southeast -- varsity starting at 6 p.m. on Saturday.
