Dawson Bucs Bounce Back with Win Over Gillette
After suffering their first two losses of the season last weekend, the Dawson Bucs bounced back with a resounding 93-75 win vs. the Gillette College Pronghorns at home on Saturday night. Dawson raced out to a fourteen point lead halfway through the opening half before Gillette cut it to a six point deficit at the half. The Bucs dominated the second half 53-41 to secure the lop-sided win and move to 6-2 on the season.
"We got knocked down pretty hard last week," explained Dawson Coach Joe Peterson. "So it was good to see us get back up and battle tonight. We played with better intensity on the defensive end and took better care of the ball on the offensive end. We still need to be a better rebounding team, but hopefully we will get there."
Dawson scored the first points of the game on a 3-pointer from Michael Murphy, and they held the lead the rest of the way. Brandon Hymes scored the next seven points for Dawson and they were up 10-2 when the starters were subbed out. When the starters came back in, they made another 10-2 run to claim a fourteen point advantage 28-14. The Bucs still had a double digit advantage heading into the final minute, 40-30, but Gillette closed out the half with the final four points to enter the break down by only six points. Dawson forced 11 turnovers in the first half and scored 16 points off of those turnovers. Rashad McCormick and Sayed Sayed scored 24 of the Pronghorns 34 points in the opening twenty minutes. Brandon Hymes led the home team with 13 points and 4 steals.
The Bucs were able to do a better job on Gillette's top two scorers in the second half and held the visiting team to just thirteen field goals. The saving grace for the Pronghorns was twenty-one free throws and nine offensive rebounds. The Dawson starters began the second half on a 19-7 tear to blow the game open, led by six points from Brandon Hymes and eight points from Aries Lewis, including two three-point goals. From that point it was pretty much smooth sailing, Ade Onaleye came off the bench to score 19 points after intermission. The Bucs shot 56% in the second half, outscoring the Pronghorns by 16 points in the paint. They built the lead up to twenty seven points with four minutes left before Gillette closed the game on a 15-6 run.
Coach Peterson continued, "Our first group played really well all night long. They competed hard, moved the ball and really controlled the game. We show flashes of being a really good team, but we still have to do it more consistently over forty minutes, and every single night no matter where we are playing."
Dawson's defense forced twenty turnovers in the game and held Gillette to 43% field goals and 30% on 3-pointers. The Bucs shot 47% from the field and outscored the Pronghorns 52-34 in the paint and 25-12 off turnovers.
Ade Onaleye had a game high 28 points on 10-15 shooting from the field and 4-7 from long range. Brandon Hymes stuffed the stat sheet with 23 points on 10-15 shooting, 6 rebounds, 5 steals and 3 assists. Michael Murphy rounded out the double digit scorers with 16 points on 6-9 shooting from the field. Sayed Sayed led Gillette with 19 points. Jada Bolok had a game high 13 rebounds.
Dawson will hit the road again to play next weekend in the Casper Thanksgiving Classic. They will play Casper College on Friday night and then Western Wyoming College on Saturday.
