Dodge City men's basketball made it back-to-back wins in the KJCCC play after taking down Independence in a high-scoring conference tilt, claiming the 101-92 win.
The win moves the Conquistadors to 4-5 on the season and 2-1 in KJCCC action while making it five-straight wins in the series with the Pirates of Independence. The win also marks the 50th of Head Coach, Brad Witherspoon in his career amassing 50 wins in just a little over two full seasons as a head coach.
Both teams would find stretches of strong offensive play and big stretches of tough buckets, but it was Independence that started that trend on the day working a 9-2 advantage early. The Conqs would get a layup by Chevalier "Ice" Emery to tie the contest at 12-12 with 15:30 left in the first half. The game would remain with four points one way or the other until the Conqs pushed their lead to seven at 30-23 behind a Tyree Jackson three-pointer with seven minutes left in the first half but the lead would never get over eight in the first half. Heading into intermission the Conqs held the 42-39 advantage. In the second half the Conqs constantly fended off the Pirates from taking the lead despite Independence tying the game several times and then just over four minutes into the second half the Pirates snagged the lead at 54-52 on a pair of free throws. The lead was short-lived, but the game remained tight with each team trading buckets the Conqs put together a 10-2 run over a three and half minute stretch and led 94-83 with just over three minutes to go. Again, the Pirates surged back making it 94-92 with 1:27 remaining but the Conqs would do the rest of the scoring on the day tallying the final seven points of the game to secure the 101-92 win.
The Conqs tallied a season-high 101 points (fifth time scoring 100+ points under Coach Witherspoon – 4-1 record in those games) and did it on a season-best 52.2% shooting with a season-high 17 points on 35 made field goals. The Conqs also took care of the ball with a season-low 13 turnovers forcing the Pirates into 22 turnovers.
Emery had another big game scoring dropping 27 points on 10-17 shooting and added seven assists and three rebounds, while Marius Canery had a strong performance with 18 points on 7-11 shooting, dropping 16 of his 18 in the second half. Hunter Duncan had his first career double-double with 14 points and 10 rebounds while adding five assists, and five steals. Tyler Williams added a career-high 12 points with five rebounds and two blocks, while both Jackson, Avnoor Bhullar, and Jamari Gamble each tallied nine points.
The Conqs continue the season on Wednesday, November 29th when they travel to Pratt for a 7:30 pm tip to keep KJCCC rolling.
