Mark Ogden Jr. scored 12 of his team-high 16 points in the first half as Dixie State clinched a Pacific West Conference tournament berth with an 88-68 victory over Holy Names on Saturday night in Oakland, California. The Storm pushed their season-high winning streak to six games and has won 10 of their last 12 overall to move to 15-8, 12-5 in conference play.
Dixie State led virtually the entire game as Ogden Jr. scored six of the Storm’s first eight as DSU jumped out to a quick 8-3 lead. The Hawks chipped away at the deficit, eventually taking their only lead of the game at 15-14 after consecutive baskets from Isaiah Juarez.
DSU then broke the game open as the Storm went on a 19-3 run during a near 10-minute span, including 13-straight points during a six-minute stretch, to race out to a 33-18 lead with 2:50 to play until intermission. Freshman forward Quincy Mathews tallied five points in the run off the bench, while Ogden Jr. added four points, as the Storm ultimately outscored HNU, 28-10, in the final 12 minutes of the stanza to take a 42-27 lead into the locker room.
Dixie State kept the momentum to start the second half, outscoring the Hawks, 13-4, to bolt its biggest lead of the game at 55-31 with 16:12 to go. The Storm extended the lead to as many as 30 points before settling for the 20-point margin.
Ogden Jr. connected on 8-of-12 from the floor and pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds en route to his fourth-straight double-double and fifth in his last six games overall. The senior also moved into fourth place on the Storm’s single-season rebounding list with 229 caroms to date.
In all, five Storm players scored in double figures, including starters Brandon Simister and Trevor Hill with 10 points apiece. In addition, reserve forward Zac Hunter added 12 points and freshman Quincy Mathews poured in a career-high 10 points as the Storm bench tallied a season-high 36 points.
“It was a good win and now we’re automatically in the [PacWest] tournament, so that’s something we can take off our list of our goals,” head coach Jon Judkins said. “We did a good job of attacking inside. You take advantage of what you are doing well and we got the ball inside and got some easy baskets.”
Dixie State shot 56.7 percent (34-of-60) from the floor, marking the fifth time in the last nine games that the Storm shot better than 50 percent in a game. DSU also hit on 18-of-24 (.750) from the line and outrebounded the Hawks, 43-23. The Storm also had 18 assists on their 34 made baskets, including four dimes for senior Mason Sawyer, but DSU did turn the ball over 21 times, with 12 of those miscues coming in the second half.
“I challenged our guys [to play like it was] a tournament atmosphere. This is game one and let’s go get game two on Monday [at Dominican], and we’ll worry about game three another time,” Judkins said. “Monday is going to be a good game. Dominican is a good team and we’ve got to play better than we played tonight.”
Dixie State continues its Northern California road swing Monday at Dominican University at 7:30 p.m., in San Rafael.
Steve Johnson is the Associate Athletic Director for Media Relations and Collegiate Licensing at Dixie State University. For more DSU Athletics news, please visit www.dixieathletics.com and follow Dixie State on Twitter at @DixieAthletics.