The Arlee High School boy’s basketball team continued to assert its dominance in its Class-C Western conference with an opening victory against Hot Springs.

The Warriors defeated the Savage Heat 83-47 Thursday night at Hot Springs Gymnasium.

“We played well and the team shot well from the 3-point line,” Warriors’ Coach Zanen Pitts said. “Greg Whitesell was 7-for-13 from the 3-point line, Will Mestes was 3-for-5, and we were able to shoot 10 3-pointers in the game. We just shot really well and played really heavy defense.”

Two of Arlee’s leading scorers Tyler Tanner and Phillip Malatar, were contained by the Savage Heat defense but they were able to still find ways to be effective, according to Pitts.

“(Tanner and Malatar) still got their points,” Pitts said. “They are unselfish when they are getting contested because someone else must be open. They got two 3-pointers that were contested. They are going to keep passing until someone gets the open look. You have to honor the high-percentage shots.”

Despite being heavily pressured, Tanner finished the game with 16 points, eight steals, and eight assists. This is just two steals and assists shy of recording a triple-double. Malatar scored 14 points, nine rebounds, five steals, and five steals

“It was pretty awesome and he played really well,” Pitts said. “He didn’t need to score but got his buckets and started setting up other guys. If one of our players is shooting well from the floor, our team is going to keep going to that person. Our team tries to play like the Golden State Warriors or the San Antonio Spurs. They are very unselfish and look for the open basket. (Our team) is just extremely patient and very unselfish.”

Pitts said he is excited about the progression of his Warriors at this juncture of the season.

“We have played very poorly, which is good,” Pitts said. “There were a lot of moments where we were really flat. We are far from peaking and accomplishing what we want to accomplish as a team. We have a lot to fix yet and we are playing well right now.”

Early in the game the Savage Heat challenged the Warriors.

“Defensively, Hot Springs got a jump start and came out pretty fast,” Pitts said. “There were moments where they played better. We won the boards again and Tyler had a big part in us winning the boards. On defense, our guys are still learning their role and their rotation. They go out and still see some areas where we are out of position. We still have a couple more things to get corrected.”

The Warrior’s goal is to hold every team to 40 points.

“Holding teams to 40 points and committing zero turnovers aren’t realistic goals,” Pitts said. “Having goals like that gives our kids something to shoot for and makes it really tough to fight. They are always motivated and it’s really fun to coach because our guys want to win more than anything. They don’t care about their stats.”