Jimmies keep up incendiary play with 84-71 win at Dakota Wesleyan
Feb. 1—MITCHELL, S.D. — The No. 11-ranked University of Jamestown went into halftime only up by three but a 22-6 run to open the second half helped the Jimmies get an 84-71 win over Dakota Wesleyan University on Wednesday, Feb. 1, at the Corn Palace.
"I thought we were defending at a high level and our defense led to our offense," Jimmies head coach Danny Neville said. "We made some shots and we got it going and started going to some actions that were working for us."
The Tigers (12-12, 8-8) sprinted out of the gates to a 16-7 lead before the Jimmies' Cooper Olson hit back-to-back layups to cut the deficit to 16-11 with 11:43 to go in the first half. That kickstarted a 10-5 run from the Jimmies (21-3, 13-3) to tie the game up at 21. After the Tigers pushed the lead back out to 27-21, the Jimmies called a timeout. Out of the stoppage, the Jimmies went on an 8-0 run to take their first lead of the day at 29-27 with 6:06 to go in the first half. The Jimmies lead ballooned to as large as nine points over the final six minutes when Cole Woodford splashed a three to make it 38-29 with 4:22 to go in the first half. Woodford had a big first half for the Jimmies scoring 15 of the team's 44 points.
Early in the second half, the Jimmies' Reid Gastner hit a layup to push the lead out to 42-37, which started a 22-6 run over the first 10 minutes of the second half to push the lead out to 62-43. The Tigers would not go down quietly though as they fought back over the next five minutes to cut the deficit to 69-59 with 5:03 to go in the game. The Jimmies were able to stretch the lead back out on their way to their ninth consecutive win.
"There's a theme of why we're on this run and I think the biggest theme is defense and pressure and not allowing teams to do what they like to do," Neville said. "We always feel good about offense, sometimes we don't shoot well and stuff like that but for the most part we're an offensive team and if we can continue to guard and continue to play defense, who knows."
Woodford finished the game with 26 points on 9-for-13 shooting.
"I just played with confidence and my teammates did a good job of finding me when I was open," Woodford said.
The Jimmies are back in action at 3:45 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 4, when they host Midland.
UJ 84, DWU 71
UJ: 40 44 — 84
DWU: 37 34 — 71
Points leaders:
UJ: Cole Woodford 26, Mason Walters 24, Marc Kjos 11, Reid Gastner 11
DWU: Diang Gatluak 19, Blaze Lubbers 15, Jakob Dobney 15, Alan Kikwaki 9
Assists leaders:
UJ: Kjos 7, Walters 4, Colby Vazquez 2, Cooper Olson 2
DWU: Oppold 5, Kallan Herman 4, Gatluak 3
Leading rebounders:
UJ: Walters 8, Gastner 6, Woodford 3
DWU: Lubbers 11, Kikwaki 5, Oppold 2, Gatulak 2, Dobney 1, D'Andre Dennis 1, Nick Wittler 1, Sam Aslesen 1
