As the regular season approaches its final week, Todd Cripe is not happy with the way his Wellsville-Middletown girls basketball team is playing.

“We’re playing pretty bad basketball right now,” the W-M coach said. “We have played bad basketball since the Keytesville Tournament. We’re not a good team right now. That’s all there’s to it.”

The Tigers lost 51-41 to Bowling Green in a Homecoming game on Feb. 9 after having an 11-point halftime lead. It’s the fourth time this season the W-M girls had a double-digit lead, but failed to pull off the victory.

The Tigers took a 12-12 record into their regular season finale at Wright City on Feb. 15. Three weeks ago, they were 9-6 after winning the Keytesville Tournament for the second straight year.

“Our record is a microcosm of our season,” Cripe said. “We’re like the freaking Screamin’ Eagle at Six Flags. We’re up and down.”

The Tigers have reached double digits in victories for the third straight season. They were 16-11 last year to finish with their first winning season under Cripe.

Now, W-M hopes to turn in a strong effort in the postseason. Cripe’s team earned the No. 4 seed in the seven-team Class 1, District 9 tournament, which is scheduled to start on Feb. 19 at Blair Oaks High School in Jefferson City. St. Elizabeth is host of the tournament.

“We’re lucky to be the fourth seed,” Cripe said. “I was upset at the time, but after a performance (against Bowling Green), I’m not really upset. We’re probably where we need to be.”

W-M will take on fifth-seeded Jamestown in a quarterfinal game on Feb. 19. The winner will play top-seeded St. Elizabeth in the semifinals at 5:30 p.m. on Feb. 21.

The Tigers finished second at districts in each of the last two years. Cripe said in order for his team to clear the district hurdle, it must have strong efforts from seniors Bethany Slovensky, Jenelle Boeckelman and Meagan Cripe and juniors Keigan Hall, Indica Scott and Hallie Guzy.

“This is where we’re going to need our junior and senior leaders, who played varsity for 3-4 years,” Cripe said. “We have to be able to do those things. We’ve got to be able to do those things. We have to be able to execute what we want to do. We have to be able to defend, we have to rebound, we have to be strong and we have to take care of the ball.”

Slovensky and Guzy each scored 14 points to lead the Tigers against Bowling Green, which snapped a 10-game losing streak. Slovensky fouled out earlier in the fourth quarter.

The Tigers struggled from the free-throw line, making only 40 percent (10 of 25).

“I have gotten to the point where I stopped talking about it,” Cripe said. “I stopped saying anything. I didn’t say anything. Either they’re going to make them or they don’t. If we make them, we have a chance to win. If we miss them, we’re going to lose. Lately, we’ve been missing them. So we lose.”

W-M led 28-17 at halftime before Bowling Green rallied to pull off the win. The Bobcats outscored the Tigers 12-2 in the overtime period.

W-M also had double-digit leads against Hermann in the Montgomery County Invitational in November and in contests against Westran and Community R-6 in the New Franklin Tournament in January, but lost all three games.

Also, the W-M boys lost 61-32 to Bowling Green, which was played after the girls game. Gage Marshall scored 16 and Cooper Henderson added 10 to lead the Tigers, who are now 2-20 following losses to Marion County and Silex and will end their regular season on Feb. 15 at Wright City.

W-M drew the No. 7 seed in the seven-team Class 2, District 5 tournament at Clopton High School. The Tigers will take on second-seeded Harrisburg in a quarterfinal game at 6:30 p.m. on Feb. 20.