TMS boys basketball opens

This weekend saw the season openers for Thermopolis Middle School Boys Basketball, with the seventh grade team taking on Cody and Powell at home and the eighth graders going up against Cody and Powell at Cody.

The eighth grade boys’ first game was a 36-33 loss against Cody. Eighth grade coach, Shane Corpening, stated, ” This game was our first game of the season and it looked exactly like that. We made a few too many critical mistakes — turnovers and allowing second chance points — for us to win this game. But, we did play really hard and that was good to see. We were down by about 10 points with two minutes left in the game and we cut the lead to three very quickly. We had a chance at the end to force overtime, but we did not convert.”

Their second game was a 41-38 victory against Powell. Corpening stated, “There was much improvement from Game 1 to Game 2 and we really looked like a completely different team. We did a much better job of taking care of the ball and limiting second chance points, which are huge aspects of a basketball game.

“Also on offense we were consistently aggressive in attacking the basket which is a cornerstone of our offense.” The boys’ third game was Tuesday evening in Worland and Corpening was excited excited to see the improvement from Game 2 to Game 3.

Corpening said there were a lot of numbers on the teams, with 18 eighth graders coming out and 10 seventh graders. Having coached many of the now eighth grade students last year, he knows they’ve got some good size, speed and athleticisim.

“The seventh grade, they’re looking pretty solid,” Corpening said, noting they are a bit small “but they’re definitely a really scrappy and quick team.” Seventh grade coach, Mitch Baker, agreed they did need some size, but would also like to see more numbers, as they have only 10 for both A and B teams.

The coaches have been working a lot with fundamentals and stressing defense with the kids. “In terms of what we’re trying to do,” Corpening said, “I think defense is really important at the beginning of the season. I think offense can evolve as the season goes.”