The playoffs start Tuesday.
For the Douglas boys' basketball team, that's just the way it has to be.
The Tigers dropped a 76-63 decision to Reno at Douglas High Saturday night to fall to 3-6 in league and put themselves in the position of needing to win their final three game of the regular season on the road this week in order to clinch a playoff spot.
"That's when it starts for us," Douglas coach Keith Lewis said after the loss. "We're still in control of our own destiny right now. The bottom line is we have to get it done this week and if we don't, then we probably don't deserve to be in the postseason.
"We just told the guys tonight to get away from it all tomorrow, do something not related to basketball and then come in Monday focused on what needs to happen this week."
Saturday night, Douglas solved the issues it had with Reno's press in the two teams' first matchup by simply finding ways to execute its passes downcourt.
"Their press actually started working to our advantage tonight," Lewis said. "We didn't really change anything from last week. It just came down to execution, getting away from holding the ball too long and getting away from letting them trap us along the baseline."
The result was a solid first half for the team offensively, which included 19 points for sophomore center Keith Olson.
"Keith gives you a big target right there in the middle on the press-break and we were able to use that to our advantage," Lewis said.
Olson finished the game with 25 points.
Defensively, the Tigers held the Huskies to only two double-digit scorers after being torched with five double-figure players from Reno last week.
Unfortunately, what they couldn't stop was Reno's rangy forward J.J. Mulligan, who went off with eight 3-pointers and 34 points on the night.
"We got lost in the switches on him," Lewis said. "They did a great job of running him off of a series of screens and we would be fine through the first and second screens and then it seemed like we couldn't hold him after that.
"He's too good a player to let him get away from us and he didn't miss any when he was open."
It was Mulligan who single-handedly seemed to keep the Tigers from getting too close late in the game.
Douglas opened up a 14-10 lead early on 12 points from Olson, but two Mulligan 3-pointers put the Huskies out in front for the remainder of the game.
The closest the Tigers would get after that was after Eric Emm hit the front end of a pair of free throws. Olson put back the rebound off Emm's second-shot miss to pull Douglas within four at 42-38.
Mulligan then hit 3-pointers on two consecutive trips down the floor, again, and the Tigers got no closer than six after that.
"I thought all the way around as a team we did a better job this week of containing Reno than we did last, but the game was just a synopsis of the whole year," Lewis said. "It's like a broken record. We're there, we're there, we're there and then we just go into a spell of making four or five bad decisions and that's it."
Douglas also got solid offensive numbers from Skylar McNabb, who sported an excellent off-the-dribble fade all night on his way to 10 points and two 3-pointers. Emm and Bryan Brady each put up six points for the Tigers, Sam Sourikoff put up five and Tyson Estes had four.
Douglas travels to Wooster Tuesday, Carson Friday and North Valleys Saturday to wrap up the regular season.
It's a tough road swing, especially considering the parity in the Sierra League season. The good news for the Tigers is that their three league wins, each being one of the most impressive performances Douglas has had this season, have come against their three upcoming opponents.
"I asked them all if they've won before in every one of those gyms we'll be visiting this week, and every guy in there can raise his hand and say he has," Lewis said. "They know how to win against these teams, but they just need to get it done now."
