Washington basketball will hope that the friendly confines of the Demon Den will provide the setting for some wins as they host their first varsity doubleheader of the season tonight against Grinnell, and you can hear all the action on KCII.

The Washington girls are off to a 1-1 start and looking to bounce back from a 48-33 loss to Albia Tuesday evening. The Demons have a capable group of guards that includes junior Adalyn Long, who leads the team with 22 points across the first two games and averaged over 12 points a game last season.

Senior Kendall Hnirichsen also leads the backcourt after putting up nearly eight points and three steals per contest last season. But Washington failed to make a basket from the field in the second quarter Tuesday, a big reason for the loss and a cold stretch that head coach Shannon Rugg tells KCII Sports his team has to learn how to manage.

“We’re getting the looks we want,” Rugg says. “They’re just not falling. So we’ve just got to keep firing away, and the girls did that. I don’t think we ever really forced a lot of shots up. We just had an off night shooting.”

While the girls will take on a Grinnell team that lost its first game of the season Tuesday, the Washington boys are looking to respond from losing their season opener to Albia 82-49.

The Demons have all but one starter back from last year’s team, including senior Logan McDole, who led the squad in scoring, rebounding and assists; and junior guard Drew Conrad, who scored nearly 12 points per game last season.

Sophomore Nic Stone also flashed some improving skills by scoring a team-high 12 points in the opener. Head coach Collin Stark tells KCII Sports that Stone is turning into a great offensive weapon.

“He’s an extremely good shooter,” Stark says, “and he’s been working on his game to also be able to attack the basket and play even better defense as well.”

Washington will be facing a Grinnell team that also dropped its opener Tuesday to Newton. The Demons try to tame the Tigers, and you can hear both games this evening on 106.1 FM KCII and streaming on KCIIradio.com and the KCII1 app, starting with the Countdown to Tip-Off at 5:30.