Sports

DCB makes it three

By Staff reports

03/03/2015

Last Wednesday, the Dakota College at Bottineau (DCB) women’s basketball team found itself with three times as many wins as the Ladyjacks have available players.

Four days later, DCB won its third consecutive National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) Region XIII title.
The Ladyjacks moved onto the second stage of the postseason last week following a pair of wins in the Region XIII tournament.

DCB downed United Tribes Technical College (UTTC) 105-50 on Wednesday in Bottineau before besting Gogebic Community College (GCC) 91-82 on Sunday in the regional final in Ironwood, Mich.

DCB (22-10) will travel south this weekend to take part in the District F championship game against either Southeast Community College (Neb.) or Central Community College (Neb.) on Sunday. Southeast and Central played out the Region IX title game on Monday after press time.

Just to get to the district final, though, the Ladyjacks had to navigate past a team they had defeated twice before and another DCB hadn’t faced this season before. In the end, the seven-member Ladyjacks prevailed in both regional playoff outings.

DCB DOWNS THUNDERBIRDS

DCB’s first foray into this year’s postseason was relatively straightforward. The Ladyjacks welcomed to Bottineau a UTTC team DCB defeated twice during the regular season, and on Wednesday DCB cruised to victory in the teams’ third and final meeting of the 2014-15 campaign.

The Thunderbirds, which fell to DCB both in Bottineau and at home in Bismarck during the regular season, were competitive early in Wednesday’s game. The Ladyjacks had trouble early in creating separation and only led 29-21 with at the media timeout with just under eight minutes left in the first half.

From there on, though, DCB took over. The Ladyjacks ended the first half on a 21-5 run to take a 50-26 lead into the break, and UTTC was unable to find a way back into the game.

“The last six or seven minutes of that first half, we put a really good string together and that gave us a comfortable cushion going into halftime,” DCB head coach Wayne Johnson said. “After that, our shooters shot well and everyone made good contributions as the game kept going.

“I just thought it was a really good effort by us tonight,” Johnson continued. “I thought we were ready for what they were going to throw at us, and I was a little worried about that going in, but we did a great job tonight of sharing the basketball and hitting open teammates and kept our bad stretches to a minimum.”

UTTC had to deal with its own lack of available players. Only six Thunderbirds made the trip on Wednesday, and one fouled out with UTTC down 89-40 with 9:26 remaining in the game.

DCB sophomore guards Chelsea Frazier and Imani Scott finished the game with team-leading 35 and 27 points, respectively.

The Ladyjacks were also deadly from the free-throw line, sinking 16 of their 17 shots from the stripe.

THREE-PEAT

Following the win over UTTC, the Ladyjacks made the 20-hour round trip to Michigan to face Gogebic in the Region XIII championship game. DCB faced a much sterner test against the Lady Samsons than it had against UTTC, but the Ladyjacks again came through when they had to.

Frazier and Scott were again DCB’s leading lights in the regional final. Frazier, who was later named the Region XIII most valuable player, finished the game with a team-high 27 points.
Scott, who along with Frazier was named to the Region XIII all-tournament team, dropped 24 points on the Lady Samsons. DCB freshman forward Mattie Schmitt scored 22 of her own.

The District F champion will move on to the NJCAA tournament in Overland Park, Kan.