The Lady Panther basketball team opened their season at the East/ West basketball classic in Buffalo Dec. 8-9 and went home with a 2-1 record under their belts.

The team started the tournament by playing the Rawlins Lady Outlaws who were number five in pre-season rankings Friday and took away a close win with the  final score being 49-47.

Junior Post Rachel Bonander believed that the team played many aspects of the game very well, but there are also parts that need work.

“We did really well with breaking their press and handling the pressure,” Bonander said. “But I think we need to work on our help defense.”

The team then went on to play the Buffalo Lady Bison that evening and finished the game with a win of 42-32. The Lady Panthers played a tight defense to shut down the posts inside the paint,

and not give up any outside shots.

Bonander had a double-double in both the Rawlins and Buffalo games, racking up 16 rebounds per game.

The toughest match-up of the weekend was against the number one ranked team in 3A, the Douglas Lady Bearcats. Douglas had defeated Lander (67-49) and Cody (64-41) the day before, and the Lady Panthers were anticipating their match-up with the Lady Bearcats very eagerly.

As the number 10 team in the state, playing the number one team was a chance for the Lady Panthers to prove themselves as a team.

“We came out knowing that we weren’t supposed to win, but we knew that we could win if we brought enough intensity to make it a good game,” said junior guard Aubrie Stenerson.

The Lady Bearcats play a fast game and love to push the floor. To combat these tactics, the Lady Panthers had to slow down the game and take care of the ball to avoid steals, because the Lady Bearcats get the majority of their points off of steals and breakaway layups.

“I think we were playing really good defense,” said Stenerson.

In the end, the Lady Panthers lost 45-29 to the Lady Bearcats. Until that point, the teams were not separated by more than a few points, with Douglas pulling away late.

After the tournament came to an end, the Lady Panthers played their first home game of the season against the 2A Lovell Lady Bulldogs the following Tuesday.

The Lady Panthers were forced to play a tight defense on the Lady Bulldog’s guards because they had several skilled outside shooters but not much size in the post.

The lady Panthers played a good first half defensively and offensively with the score being 26-19 at the half.

At one point the two teams were tied up at 28-28, but the Lady Panthers pulled ahead to win the game 46-37.

The team is now going into Christmas break with a record of 3-1, and ranked number four in 3A.