Leading scorers for Dove Creek included senior Hayden Gray, who scored 16 points, junior Kade Hankins, who netted 15 points, and junior Ryan Jarmon, who knocked down two 3-pointers and scored nine points in his team\u2019s loss.<\/p>\n
Ignacio was led offensively by Bryce Finn, who scored a game-high 16 points and Brady McCaw, who chipped in 14. Gabe Tucson and Dylan Labarthe each scored 11 points for the Bobcats.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just came out hot, and I think we surprised them a little bit in the first half,\u201d said Gray. \u201cThey weren\u2019t ready for it. Our lack of players after Chorbin (Cressler) got hurt and (Tanner Williams) was gone hurt us a little bit. We got tired, and we couldn\u2019t hit any outside shots in the second half.\u201d<\/p>\n
While several factors contributed to Dove Creek\u2019s first-half blitz of the Bobcats, chief among them was Gray\u2019s play in the post, as the senior consistently overpowered Finn on his way to 12 first quarter points that helped his team build a 20-12 lead by the end of the first quarter.<\/p>\n
Although Ignacio began to find its offensive rhythm in the second half, thanks in part to a transition layup by Labarthe and nine second quarter points by Finn, the Bulldogs maintained their lead as Hankins hits three smooth pull-up jumpers before closing the half with a free throw to put his team ahead 30-25 heading into halftime.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had great energy,\u201d Hankins said. \u201cWe\u2019ve come out on fire the last couple of games, we just haven\u2019t been able to carry it on to the second half. In the beginning of the season, we were doing good at that, but lately, we just can\u2019t carry it out.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Dove Creek\u2019s lack of energy and lack of depth certainly affected it in the second half, so, too, did Ignacio head coach Chris Valdez\u2019s decision to switch to a zone defense and double-team Gray whenever he touched the ball during the third and fourth quarters.<\/p>\n
With the paint packed with Ignacio defenders and Dove Creek\u2019s senior forward unable to score inside, the scoring onus fell to Hankins, Jarmon and the Bulldogs other young guards, who seemingly couldn\u2019t buy a shot during the third and fourth quarters.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first half, we were hitting all our shots and getting it into the post,\u201d Hankins said. \u201cIn the second half, they stopped falling. (Ignacio) started hitting all their shots and we started hitting nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
After quickly erasing the Bulldogs\u2019 five-point lead with a 6-0 run that ended with a fast-break layup by Tucson, Ignacio continued to apply pressure and pulled away as McCaw drained consecutive 3-pointers midway through the quarter and Joe Garcia closed the quarter with a 3-pointer from the left corner to put his team ahead 47-36.<\/p>\n
More 3-pointers by Tucson and McCaw, who each hit two during the fourth quarter, put Dove Creek in deeper hole and although the Bulldogs continued to fight during the final eight minutes, they were never able to pull closer than 14 points as Ignacio coasted to an easy victory.<\/p>\n
With hits record now at 6-6 overall and 5-3 in the San Juan Basin League, Dove Creek will turn its attention to its final game of the regular season, at home against Dolores on March 6.<\/p>\n
San Juan Basin League champion Ignacio will put its 11-2 overall record and 9-0 league record on the line at Telluride on March 6.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hankins and Gray combine to score 31 points against league\u2019s top team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48121,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[600,80,846,29,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-48120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-basketball","tag-dove-creek","tag-ignacio-high-school","tag-newsletter","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48120"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48120\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87309,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48120\/revisions\/87309"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48120"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=48120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}