The Dons faced off against the Broncos in a tough, league matchup Wednesday night in Lafayette.
Starting for the Dons were Freshmen Gavin Dodge and Josh Elerts plus Sophomores Maddox Malm, JB Frolich, and Drew McKenzie. Gavin started us off with a midrange jumper after grabbing his own rebound off a missed three. Josh had a nice take to the hoop and Maddox cleaned up a loose ball for a layup to put us up 6-2. Josh added a bucket off our favorite inbounds play and Gavin found Conor Hession for a three to make it 12-4. Conor found Nico for a three to beat the buzzer at the end of the quarter to make it 16-7.
The Dons started to pour it on and extended their advantage to 18 points at one time, 27-9. That run included Gavin finding Josh down low, a JB score, Maddox to Josh again, a Josh to Alex three-ball and another Maddox cleanup layup. JB converted two free throws after being fouled on a reverse layup and we held a 29-18 lead at the break.
It looked like a different Dons team after half as Northgate quickly went on a 15-4 run that brought them within two, 33-31. Our only buckets during that stretch were a Gavin steal and coast-to-coast finish plus Josh hitting two free throws after being fouled and a nice saving pass from JB. Gavin steadied the ship for a moment with a baseline J and Sam Bishop hit a gorgeous three to make the score 38-33 at the end of the period.
The Broncos went on another charge to start the fourth, scoring the first 11 points to go up 44-38 before Josh scored on consecutive buckets including a nifty spin move on the assist from Conor to get us back within two. Alex Butler and Josh both split free throws and Gavin buried a huge three to get us to within 47-50 as the sand in the hourglass was quickly running out. We fouled Northgate on purpose and they split free throws to go up 4. Coming out of a timeout with about 10 seconds left, the Dons drew up a beautiful play to free Gavin for a three that failed to connect. The ball went out of bounds to the Dons with 2 second left and we inbounded again to Gavin who tried to draw a foul on a three but to no avail. The final was 47-51.
As a team, we shot 12/32 (38%) from 2FG, 5/20 (25%) from 3FG, 17/52 (33%) total and 8/14 (57%) from the stripe with 25 rebounds, 10 steals and 6 assists against 16 turnovers. Josh had a beautiful game with 15 points and 8 rebounds. Although it was a bit of an off night for Gavin, he still chipped in 10 points while Alex (+8) and Maddox (+7) led the team in +/-.
The JV Dons fall to 6-7 on the season and 2-2 in league play. Next up is Miramonte tonight 1/20 at Chris Huber Memorial Gymnasium in Lafayette at 5:30pm. Please note the start time was moved up a half hour. Also a huge rivalry game against Campo next week on Tuesday 1/24! As always, all Dons home games are live streamed on YouTube at: https://youtube.com/@acalanesbiggym1401
Thank you for your support and GO DONS!!!!
