PARKERSBURG – Sometimes it’s just not your night and that was the case for the Buckhannon-Upshur Buccaneers in their non-conference contest with the Parkersburg Big Reds Wednesday night.

The Bucs entered the game with a 5-1 record, but couldn’t handle a taxing Parkersburg press turning the ball over 22 times in a 73-52 setback.

The Bucs also suffered through their second-worst shooting night of the season making just 18 of their 53 field goals for just 33.9 percent.

“We just could never get going,” stated Buckhannon-Upshur head coach Travis Foster. “I thought we were out of position all night, especially when they started taking it to us. We know our weakness right now is breaking the press. A lot of the issues tonight were my fault. We just haven’t had a lot of time to prepare for what we saw tonight from Parkersburg and their press. We had players in a lot of awkward positions because we couldn’t find a combination to really get us past their press and into our half-court offense. Parkersburg just sped us up and kicked our backside.”

The game started out well enough for the Bucs as they held an 8-6 lead after a jumper by Harrison Walker with 4:33 showing on the first-quarter clock, but it all went south for the Bucs after that.

Parkersburg went on a 14-0 run to close the quarter taking a 20-8 lead.

The Bucs were down 30-12 before Ian Strader turned in an old-fashioned three-point play after being fouled on his lay-up and Walker made two free throws bringing them to within 13, but Elijah Hernandez drained a three at the buzzer putting Buckhannon-Upshur down 33-17 at the intermission.

Parkersburg put the game completely out of reach with a 12-0 run to start the third quarter putting the Bucs down 45-17.

Walker ended the run with a lay-up making it 45-19.

The Big Reds went up by 31, at 51-20 after a free throw by Josh Kopec, with 3:32 left in the third quarter.

The Bucs went on a 6-0 run getting baskets from Mason Hyre, Zach Calef-Boring and Lamar Hurst making it a 51-26 contest.

Buckhannon-Upshur trailed by a 56-29 score heading into the fourth quarter.

Down 61-34, the Bucs went on a 7-0 run making it a 20-point game, at 61-41, but they couldn’t get any closer.

“We have to get better and that is on me,” concluded Foster. “Sometimes though you have to fail to succeed. Parkersburg exposed a lot of our weaknesses tonight. We will use this as a learning experience. This team understands what we are trying to do and what the big goal is, and that is making the state tournament.”

Walker led all scorers with 20 points while Hurst chipped in 15 for the Bucs.

Bryson Singer and Josh Kopec each had 15 points for Parkersburg, who improved to 2-2 on the year.

The loss dropped the Bucs to 5-2 on the season.

They will return to action Monday hosting Hampshire in a non-conference contest starting at 7:30 p.m.