NJCAA D1 District Championship Preview
The Region XI Champion, Indian Hills Community College Warriors, will be traveling to Glendive, MT to take on the Region XIII Champion, Dawson Community College Buccaneers, on Saturday night at 6:00 pm with an automatic bid to the NJCAA Division 1 Men's Basketball Tournament in Hutchinson, Kansas on the line. Indian Hills has won 15 of their last 16 games while Dawson has won 16 of their last 17 games. These two teams have matched up in the District Championship three times with Indian Hills winning at home 92-65 in 2020 and 115-99 in 2022 in Iowa. Dawson beat Indian Hills 68-67 in 2021 and qualified for the NJCAA National Tournament for the first time in program history.
The #3 ranked Warriors have defeated seven nationally ranked teams this year. The #22 ranked Buccaneers have defeated two ranked teams. Indian Hills won the region championship game against Southeastern Iowa 72-56 while Dawson beat Williston State College 93-89 in their regional championship game.
Dawson's strength is in their offense. They are the #1 scoring team in the country and rank in the top fifteen in scoring average (2nd), field goal percentage (6th), offensive efficiency (6th) and net efficiency (10th).
The strength of Indian Hills lies in their defense. They hold opponents to the 12th lowest field goal percentage (38.8%), 24th lowest 3-point percentage (29.0%), and rank 17th in defensive efficiency and 15th in net efficiency.
Indian Hills has four guys averaging double figures and ten guys who score at least 7 points a game. They are led by Abdoulaye Fall who averaged 11 ppg and 4.3 rpg. Dawson has three guys averaging double figures and seven guys scoring at least 8 points a game. They are led by Seth Amunrud's 21.4 ppg and 5.6 rpg.
Dawson comes into the game with a 29-3 record. Indian Hills is 26-5, but two of their losses were games they won, but later had to forfeit.
Tickets will be sold at the door starting at 4:30 pm on Saturday. Adults are $10 and children are $5. Bucs Club passes and Gold Cards will be accepted.
