BUCYRUS — It wasn’t the start to his head coaching career that Scott Gifford envisioned.

Still, the new Bucyrus mentor kept things in perspective and found positives to take away.

Mansfield Christian returned four starters from last year compared to the Bucyrus’ one. The young Redmen hung around for about a quarter-and-a-half before falling to the veteran Flames, 64-28.

“When you look in the Mansfield News Journal this morning and they’ve got two of the top 20 guys in Mansfield, returning four starters, realistically, I knew what we were up against,” Gifford said. “We were going to have to play a flawless game and I don’t like to make excuses, but our point guard, our general (Malachi Bayless) has been hurt the last three days. I kept that under wraps.”

Bayless played through the injury, though less than 100 percent. He was held to two points by the Mansfield Christian defense. Bayless wasn’t the only one to struggle scoring as the Redmen hit just nine of 42 shots from the field.

“We like to play a full court man (defense) and speed things up,” Flames coach Cary Craner said. “When you’re sped up, it’s hard to get your feet set.”

Mansfield Christian turned the defense into offense, hitting 27 of 60 action shots. Bucyrus was able to stay close in the first quarter, trailing only 16-12.

However, the Flames started the second period on a 9-0 run to expand their lead to 25-12 and the Redmen could never get the offense untracked from there.

“That’s (the first quarter) what we’re going to take away from it,” Gifford said. “I told them I was super happy with the way we played the first quarter, not too bad the second quarter. So, we know we can play with (good) teams.”

It was Mansfield Christian that played nearly flawlessly, committing only eight turnovers, just two in the first half.

“That’s one of the things from last year to this year we’ve coached on,” Craner said. “We really have to not turn the basketball over. It’s key to us to be successful.”

Mansfield Christian held a 35-19 lead at halftime and then blew the game open in the final two periods by connecting on 14 of 25 shots, while holding the hosts to 3 of 21.

“They did better (shooting) the second half,” Craner said. “I think in the first half it as first game jitters. We did shoot the ball.”

The poor Bucyrus shooting began at the perimeter, according to the coach.

“I think we were 0-7 from three,” Gifford said. “When you don’t shoot from the outside, they can pack it in.”

Noah Burke led the Redmen with nine points and eight rebounds. Kavan Combs added six points.

“Not that it would have made a huge difference, but when Malachi scores two points, you’re in trouble.”

Star guard Amarr Davis led all scorers with 21 points and grabbed 13 rebounds. Davis Wushinske added 15 points — including three 3s — while post Griffin Baker had four points and pulled down nine rebounds.

“If we can get Baker and Davis and Wushinske playing together and sharing the ball, sharing the scoring, they’re a fun team to watch,” Craner said.

“How many wide-open layups did we miss?” Gifford rhetorically asked. “There’s some low-hanging apples to pick and get better from.”

“We have not opened the season with a win in about eight years, so it feels good to do that,” Craner said. “We’ve just got to keep getting better every night.”

“We only return one starter. So, you have four other guys who have this as their first varsity experience,” Gifford said. “Everybody was jayvee last year. They get out here, under the lights, big crowd, you’re going to have little mishaps. We’ll get it fixed and we’ll make the community proud in due time.”

Bucyrus earned a split on the night with a 52-22 victory in the junior varsity game. Georgie Floyd led the Redmen with 14 points and Chris Neale added nine. Blayne Morrow topped the Flames with eight.

Box score

Mansfield Christian   16      19      16      13 — 64

Bucyrus                           12        7         4        5 — 28

Mansfield Christian (1-0): Shots 27-60; 3-pt. shots 5-12 (Davis Wushinske 3, Brock Rentzel 2); Free throws 5-13; Rebounds 40 (Amarr Davis 13); Turnovers 8. Scoring: Davis Wushinske 6 0 15, Connor Loose 1 0 2, Brock Rentzel 3 0 8, Amarr Davis 9 3 21, Gabe Westfield 2 1 5, Luke Zerby 3 1 7, Isaac Hillman 1 0 2, Griffin Baker 2 0 4.

Bucyrus (0-1): Shots 9-42; 3-pt. shots 0-8; Free throws 10-20; Rebounds 32 (Noah Burke 8); Turnovers 20. Scoring: Tyson O’Brien 2 0 4, Noah Burke 3 3 9, Kameron Lewis 0 5 5, Kavan Combs 3 0 6, Malachi Bayless 0 2 2, Tyrone Mass 1 0 2.

JV: Bucyrus 52-22.