Dragons push past Prep

By Bailey Terry

The Blue Dragon men’s basketball team played at home in the Hutch Pawn and Jewelry Classic on Nov. 13 and 14.

Within the last two games, the Dragon’s opponents scored 28 3-pointers, but they were still able to win both games.

Head Coach Steven Eck talked about the long shots.

“Their stats didn’t show they shoot well from the three, so we just stopped their lay-ups and free throws at the beginning,” Coach Eck said.

“We changed up our game to stop them from shooting more threes.”

The Dragons played On-Point Prep Nov. 14 and won 89-61.

Prep made seven of their first 10 threes.

On the seventh three, Prep had their biggest lead of the game, which was nine points.

The score was 16-25, with Hutch behind and eight minutes remaining in the half.

With three minutes remaining, the Dragons took the lead, 31-29.

Shakur Juiston, Paterson, New Jersey, scored six straight points, two dunks and a layup.

The score was 37-29.

At the end of the half, the Dragons had the lead 40-32.

As the second half begun, Prep scored three more 3-pointers and another field goal to take cut the lead down to one.

The score was 44-43.

After a seven-point run by Akbar Hoffman, Newark, New Jersey, and a few more points from the Dragons, Hutch had a lead of 55-43 with 13 minutes to go.

During the final minutes of the game, the Dragons continued to build their lead and won the game, 89-61.

To help the Dragons take the game was the leading scorer, Hoffman.

Hoffman scored a career-high of 25 points.

Juiston scored a season-high of 21 points.

He scored eight of nine field goals also he added seven rebounds, three assists, and two steals.

During the off-season, the shot clock was changed from 35 seconds to 30 seconds to help speed up the game offensively.

“It makes a difference,” Coach Eck said. “It seems like you have to rush your offense. It will help us because the other teams stall the first 20 seconds and only have 10 seconds to score.”

On Nov. 13, Hutch took on Lamar and won 102-88.

Samajae Haynes-Jones, Wichita, scored 17 points and Ahmed added 25 points.

Hutch is scheduled to play Western Texas College on Friday, Nov. 20 and Brown Mackie College on Saturday, Nov. 21 in the HCC Fall Classic.

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