WHEATLAND – The Wheatland High School Bulldog basketball team will start the season taking on Sheridan (no. 2 in 4A) at 5 p.m. on Thursday, Laramie (No. 1 in 4A) at 1:30 p.m. on Friday, and Southeast at 3 p.m. on Saturday. All games will be at Cheyenne South for boys and girls WHS teams.
The boys started the season with a 3-5 record and know it will be a tough weekend to start off in 2025 with 4A competition and a solid 2A opponent. WHS will host Gering on Thursday, the 16th (C @ 5:30 & JV @ 4 p.m. at Wheatland Middle School and varsity @ 7 p.m. at WHS). The Bulldogs will finish that week with a road trip to Lander on Saturday, Jan. 18. The Bulldogs will begin conference play on Jan. 23 when they host the Torrington Trailblazers at home (C @ 5:30 p.m. at WMS, JV @ 4 p.m. at WMS, and varsity @ 7 p.m. at WHS).
“We ended 2024 on some positives, I thought we played well at Burns, then played really well against Big Horn in our home opener,” coach Mick Cochran said of his take on the season so far, “Douglas wasn’t kind to us as we lost two more guards to injury. We played well at times but just couldn’t finish games. In 2025 our first priority will be to get healthy. We had a grueling schedule before Christmas and ended up with some injuries. We have had some young players really step up and are doing what they can to help the team improve. In the meantime, we will be trying to develop some younger players to fill in, just in case we don’t get the others back. We are going to play hard and be as competitive as we can each week.”
After the start of the season in 2024, the Bulldogs are ranked first in their conference quad, Torrington is second, Burns is third, and Rawlins is fourth. As a team WHS is averaging 42.9 points per game and allowing 45.2 points per game against which is third in 3A. On the individual side of things, statistics show sophomore Tate Nichols is seventh in 3A scoring at 15.1 points per game, and second in free-throw percentage shooting 90%; and Senior Jacob Hyche is ninth in 3A in blocked shots at 0.8 per game.