Win or go home. High stakes moving forward for this DONS team. On Tuesday night, it was likely their last home game of the season unless they a higher seed upsets a lower seed in the current NCS bracket or they can advance to state. More importantly, they had to defend homecourt first to even keep the season alive.
Archie Williams, formerly known as Sir Francis Drake HS, was renamed in 2021 to honor – you guessed it Archie Williams – a former teacher, Olympic gold medalist in the 400m dash in Berlin 1936 and a Tuskegee Airman. The name change was prompted by protests of racism and police brutality in the wake of the George Floyd incident as Sir Francis Drake was a slave trader, slave owner and colonizer.
The DONS wasted no time as the Malm Brothers connected 15 seconds in with Ryder finding Maddox for a perfect swish three as the net snapped up and hung on the rim for a few seconds. Gavin found Maddox a minute later for another high arcing swish from the opposite side. Then Maddox got a rebound and threw a 50-foot two handed chest pass up the floor to Ian who shuffled it to Brady for two. Maddox wasn’t done yet – getting the rebound, dribbling it up the court and pulling up for his third perfect three in a row, 11-4 DONS halfway through the first!
Next Brady found Gavin twice, first for a sweet pullup jumper then again on the next play for a three. Brady got into the scoring action with a pretty fallaway jumper in the post. 18-6 DONS 2:30 left! Gavin followed his own missed three for another bucket but the Peregrine Falcons clawed their way back late with two three’s (one a top of the key bank is open special) and an unorthodox baseline floater. 20-14 DONS after one.
The Falcons kept the momentum rolling in the second, scoring on three possessions in a row inside to even the score at 20 all just one minute into the period. After a DONS timeout, Joe rebounded his own shot and converted the putback. Falcons answered inside again. Then Cam found Joe in the corner for a perfect splash three as the Senior is now shooting 50% from three on the season! Brady got the ball inside to Ryder who scored easily on a little jump hook. Ryder returned the favor dishing to a cutting Brady who looked like he was going to dunk it but laid it in like in the old days when dunking was outlawed. Maddox added two on a nice little midrange crossover move. Gavin cleaned up a mess inside for two. Maddox threaded the needle to Brady in the lane for two more and it was 35-29 DONS at the break.
The Icebox did not cool off the DONS as Ryder hit Gavin five seconds into the third for another perfect swish three. #1 for the Falcons answered with a baseline jumper, a sign of things to come for the smallest player on the floor. Brady found Ryder inside for a layup then #1 struck again on a reverse layup and #2 got a steal plus the layup seconds later, DONS only up 40-35. Ryder found Maddox again for a deep three in front of the student section. Then Ryder brough the house down on a follow up dunk off an inbounds play, 45-36 DONS – DUNKOMETER +1! It felt like the DONS would finally blow this one open but #1 had other plans immediately answering with two three’ s to cut the lead to 45-42. But Big Game Joe answered with two straight of his own to get us back up 51-42. #1 hit his third in a row then Maddox whipped it to Ryder inside for the lay in as he held his shooting hand high in the air for punctuation. Cam scored on two huge fearless drives to the bucket in the final minute and #1 tacked on his fourth triple in a row as he finished with 17 points in the quarter. He singlehandedly kept the Falcons close but Dons still won the quarter and had a 58-50 lead.
Cam beat his man again, scoring on what looked like the same exact play three times in a row. #1 answered with his fifth three in a row! Was anyone going to stop this one-man wrecking crew? Cam then found Gavin in the post, using his size against the smaller #1 to bully his way to two points. Yet Archie stayed in it, only down 7 with three minutes left. Then Ryder found Maddox in the corner for his fifth three of the evening! Gavin hit Cam at the top of the key moments later and he knocked it down. Gavin hit Maddox for an easy two off the inbounds play and Brady recovered an errant pass that turned into a lefty layup. #1 would hit his sixth three in a row to cut it to 6 with 30 seconds left but the Falcons were forced to foul and the Dons would add a couple free throws for the 76-68 final.
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The Dons shot a blistering 56% (30/54) from the field, 52% (11/21) on three’s and 39% (5/13) from the line. The Falcons shot 43% (27/63) from the field, 34% (10/29) from deep and 44% (4/9) from the line. DONS outrebounded Archie 37-24. Falcons only had three turnovers as we saw no DONS press the entire game while the DONS committed 11. Points off turnovers were only 6-4 Falcons though. DONS won second chance points 11-2.
BALL MOVEMENT WATCH – WELL DONE DONS!!!
Assists on FGs Made – 20 assists on 30 field goals (67%) – 65% considered good, >75% is ideal
Assist to Turnovers – 11 turnovers (1.81) – 1.00 considered good, >1.50 is ideal
Maddox led the way in this one with the double-double of 19 points on 5/8 from deep and 10 rebounds plus 4 assists. Gavin had 15 points, 6 rebounds and 3 assists. Brady had 12 points in a perfect 5/5 performance with 4 assists, 3 rebounds and +17. Joe had 11 points on 3/4 from deep. Cam had 10 points on 4/5 with 2 assists. Ryder had 9 points, 10 rebounds, 6 assists and +14. Ian played tremendous defense all night long, holding their star player #3 to just 10 points. #1 ended up with 23 points on 8/11 and 6/9 from deep, not missing a single shot after missing his first three three’s in the first half.
Up next for the DONS (22-66) a trip past San Quentin out to Larkspur to face the Redwood Giants (20-6). Redwood advanced with a 20 point win over Montgomery in Round 1 despite being with out their big man who sustained a concussion late in last Friday night’s MCAL Final contest against Branson. The Giants are led by #2 TT Carr who has committed to Cal. The Giants are 9-0 at home while the DONS are 8-1 on the road. Versus common opponents the Dons are 4-0 while Redwood is 5-1 (losing to Marin Catholic). This will be one you don’t want to miss. Tipoff at 7PM!
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DONS DUNK-O-METER: 26 (+1) Click to see some of the BEST DUNKS of the YEAR!
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Game Photos Courtesy: Nicole Malm
