Dawson Pounds Casper College
The Dawson Bucs won their 7th straight game and moved to 12-1 on the season by taking down Casper College 97-79 on Saturday night in Glendive. The Bucs turned an 8 point deficit with six minutes to go in the first half into a four point half-time advantage. They picked up in the second half where they left off in the first half, outscoring the Thunderbirds 31-8 in the first seven minutes to claim a commanding lead at 75-55. It was the typical Dawson formula with good shooting and advantages on the glass and in forcing turnovers.
The first half was back and forth in the early going with neither team getting much of a lead. Casper made a 3-pointer and got a dunk from Stephen Osei to take their biggest lead by eight points at 34-26. Brandon Hymes had the answer for the Bucs with two straight 3's and then Jordan Jasper hit a 3-pointer to tie the game at 35. That was the start of a 20-3 run by Dawson which put them up 46-37 after a Seth Amunrud dunk. Abdul Bashir, the 2nd leading scorer in the country, scored the last five points of the half to pull Casper within four points at 44-48. It was an evenly played half with both teams shooting 53% from the field and connecting on seven 3-pointers each. The rebounding was even as well. The Bucs made one more field goal than the Thunderbirds and two more free throws to give them the four point cushion. Amunrud finished the half with 13 points and Hymes added 11 points.
The game had the look of being a tight contest throughout, but the second half was a different story. Dawson blew the gates open by scoring 24 points in the first six and a half minutes. Seth Amunrud, Aries Lewis and Kur Maler brought the crowd to their feet with three dunks in a one minute span. The Bucs pushed the lead to 33 points with 5:42 remaining, but then didn't score the rest of the game. Casper closed the game on a 15-0 run to make the final score 97-79. Before those final 15 points, Dawson held Casper to only twenty points in the first fifteen minutes of the half. The Bucs limited their visitors to 42% from the field and 20% from the 3-point line (1-5) in the second half. For the game, Dawson forced 18 turnovers and outrebounded the T-birds 31-28. Dawson finished with advantages in points in the paint (46-32), points off turnovers (26-17), and 2nd chance points (14-9).
Bashir came into the game averaging 29 points per game. Dawson held him to 20 points on 4-19 shooting. He's averaging over five 3's made per game, but only made 1-8 on Saturday.
"It took a total team effort tonight to guard Bashir and to win the rebounding battle," claimed Dawson Coach Joe Peterson. "Our depth and our pressure, along with multiple guys taking turns on him, made it hard for him to get comfortable and be efficient. And it was a war in there on the boards. They are outrebounding teams by an average of 13 on the year. We needed all five guys on every possession to do their job. Aries Lewis scrapped and clawed and got his hands on a lot of balls all night long and everyone pitched in."
Once again, Seth Amunrud led Dawson with 28 points on 10-15 shooting from the field. He also had 5 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals. The other four starters all reached double figures as well for Dawson.
The Bucs will have the next 12 days off before they head to Arizona for three games after Christmas. Their first matchup will be on December 28th against Salt Lake Community College which is currently 11-1 and ranked 6th in the country.
