Cloud County Men Down Dodge City at Home, 60-49
After building a 19-point halftime lead, the Cloud County Community College men's basketball team was forced to work through a sluggish and sloppy second half of action while holding on to defeat visiting Dodge City by a final score of 60-49 inside Arley Bryant Gymnasium in Concordia, Kansas on Wednesday, February 7th.
The 11-point victory saw the T-Birds never trail while improving to 16-7 overall and 11-6 in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference in addition to earning a regular-season split with Dodge City. The Conquistadors see a two-game winning streak snapped to fall to 9-14 overall and 7-10 in the KJCCC after being held to a season-low in points.
Poor shooting wasn't necessarily an issue for CCCC on the night as the T-Birds finished with a 40.4 percent (21-of-52) field goal percentage despite going five-for-21 (23.8 percent) from three and 13-of-20 (65.0 percent) from the charity stripe. Dodge City didn't fare any better, getting held scoreless for the first four-plus minutes of the game and shooting 29.8 percent (17-for-57) from the field to go along with a six-of-27 (22.2 percent) effort from three and nine-of-15 (60.0 percent) effort from the free throw line. Cloud County was plus-seven on the rebounding edge after collecting 41 rebounds to Dodge City's 34 while also holding a 32-16 advantage in points in the paint. Points off turnovers kept the Conquistadors in the game as DC3 outscored Cloud County 22-9 in points off turnovers and held a 16-8 advantage in fast break points.
Individually, Cheikh Sow led the T-Birds with an 18-point, 14-rebound outing to go along with four steals in 37 minutes of action while Ja'ron Briggs Jr. scored 12 points and grabbed seven rebounds. Joining the two in double-figures were Emmanuel Manyuon with 11 and Abdoulaye Fall with 10 as Roy Aviv (seven) and Ian Lavalaye (two) accounted for CCCC's remaining nine points. Dodge City got a team-high 17 from Jamari Gamble while Ice Emery pitched in 14 as only seven players for Dodge City reached the scoring column with no other Conquistador scoring more than seven.
What's Next?
The tempo is expected to get turned up a notch in Cloud County's next contest as number 15 nationally-ranked Hutchinson Community College will entertain the T-Birds for a 4 PM contest inside the Hutchinson Sports Arena on Saturday, February 10th. Cloud County will try to slow down a Blue Dragon squad that ran all over Pratt on Wednesday evening as part of a 109-78 road victory. HCC is averaging 90.4 points per game and has won their past five contests dating back to January 20th. In the season's previous meeting, Hutchinson earned an 82-73 win inside Arley Bryant Gymnasium to hand CCCC one of only two home losses this season.