Dawson Takes Care of Williston in Region XIII Semifinals
The Dawson Buccaneers handled the visiting Williston State College Tetons in the Region XIII Tournament Semifinals on Wednesday night in Glendive, 109-66. With the win, the Buccaneers will advance to the Region XIII Championship Game on Sunday for the 7th straight year and the 9th time in the past 11 years. They have won the Region Championship four times in the past six years. The Championship Game will be in Wahpeton, North Dakota against the North Dakota State College of Science Wildcats. The Region Champion will then travel to Iowa for the District Championship Game with an automatic birth to Nationals on the line.
"I love how well we followed the game plan today," shared Dawson Coach Joe Peterson. "Our coaching staff puts a ton of time into game prep and I think our guys really locked in and followed it to near perfection. We moved the ball well on offense and got great shots all night long. Defensively, we limited their transition opportunities and kept them out of the paint for the most part. On top of that, we made their two best players pretty inefficient. Our guys rose to the occasion and kept it up for forty minutes."
The first ten minutes of the game had five lead changes as the teams battled back and forth. The Bucs finally took the lead for good on a three-pointer by Kai Guess that gave them a 22-21 lead. Dawson outscored them 21-8 in the final eight minutes of the half as the Tetons looked tired in the closing minutes. It was a balanced attack that kept the pressure on and kept the pace high. The Bucs led 47-31 at the break. Guess led the way scoring 12 points. Dawson outscored the Tetons 34-12 in the paint and 18-0 on points off turnovers. The Bucs forced 15 turnovers in the first twenty minutes.
"I thought we had a lot of great shots in the first half that didn't fall," continued Peterson. "I encouraged them to just keep doing what we do and that those shots would start falling. When you are consistently getting better shots than your opponents, usually that will work out in your favor over the course of forty minutes."
Dawson stormed out of the break with an 11-4 run in the first four minutes of the second half behind the inspired play of Brandon Hymes. He ignited another run with 8:26 left in the game and Dawson leading 70-51. The 22-4 run over a four minute span gave the Bucs a 92-55 advantage and put the game out of reach. Hymes scored 8 points in that crucial stretch, while Guess added five points and Mikey Ngoyi capped it with an emphatic dunk. Dawson never let up as their bench came in and kept scoring at will to capture the lopsided win. It was the 8th time this year they scored over 100 points. Dawson outrebounded Williston by 13 rebounds in the second half. They also shot 59% from the field, 46% from the three-point line and 83% from the free throw line in the final twenty minutes. The visitors only made 3 out of 17 from the three point line in the second half.
The final game numbers leaned heavily to the home side. Dawson outrebounded Williston 47-34. They forced 23 turnovers in the game and scored 28 points off those turnovers. Dawson only turned it over 10 times themselves. The Bucs outscored them in the paint 66-30 and off the bench 58-21. Dawson shot 52.4% from the field while holding the Tetons to 39.7% shooting. They also made 9 more free throws and took 14 more shots from the field. The Bucs finished with 23 assists on the night which included 11 different players getting at least one assist. Eleven players also collected at least one rebound.
Brandon Hymes led the way with a game high 21 points, 5 rebounds, 6 assists and 4 steals. Kai Guess finished with 17 points. Off the bench, Mikey Ngoyi and Ade Onaleye rounded out the double digit scorers with 15 points and 13 points respectively. Thirteen different players scored for Dawson.
Eden Hobbs led Williston with 20 points.
The win moves Dawson to 23-8 on the year. It was their 36th straight win at home against conference opponents.
