By Jack Longo
In a four-point game with huge consequences, the Dalhousie Tigers hosted the Saint Mary's Huskies at the Dalplex on Wednesday night. Thanks to Alex Carson (Lower Sackville, NS) and his 29 points, the Tigers came away with an 87-72 victory.
Dalhousie started the game with more purpose and teamwork than their opponents. The Tigers went on a 13-4 run to start the game with Carson scoring 11 of those points. The home side also showed incredible ball movement on offence, assisting on all of their first seven baskets.
The Huskies struggled to get into their offence in the first quarter but were able to keep the score close thanks to difficult shot-making from their scoring leaders. The only players to score for Saint Mary's in the first quarter were Qyemah Gibson (Eleuthera, BH), Jayrell Diggs (East Preston, NS) and Shae Brown (Vaughan, ON).
After what was a non-stop, end-to-end first quarter, Dalhousie led 22-15.
The second quarter looked to be going similar to the first with the Tigers starting the quarter more aggressive on offence and forcing their opponents into difficult shots again. However, after Saint Mary's weathered the early storm in the second, they went on a run of their own and got the score to 32-28 for Dalhousie, forcing the home team into a timeout to stop the momentum. Again, it was Gibson, Diggs and Brown doing all the scoring for the visitors with the three scoring 32 of their team's 34 points in the first half.
Dalhousie's offence became more stagnant as the game wore on but fantastic shooting from behind the arc from Carson and great ball movement early on allowed the Tigers to take a 38-34 lead into the halftime break.
Then, the third quarter belonged to Dalhousie. The Tigers went on a quick 10-0 run to start the quarter and force a timeout from the Huskies. Unfortunately for the visitors the run didn't stop there. Dalhousie scored the first 19 points of the quarter thanks to more impressive ball movement and a change of gears from Keevan Veinot (Port Williams, NS) who started to attack the rim and push the pace on offence.
Saint Mary's started the third quarter very slowly and couldn't recover fully from there. They did start to get some buckets as the quarter came to a close and hit a buzzer beater from half court to end the third. Unfortunately for the Huskies that would be as much joy as they got the rest of the way. The Tigers led 71-52 after three quarters and didn't look back.
It was a more evenly-played quarter to end the game but the lead Dalhousie built in the third quarter proved insurmountable. The game finished 87-72 and gave Dalhousie a crucial victory in this four-point game, sending them above Saint Mary's in the standings and into first place.
The difference in this game was ultimately the third quarter run from Dalhousie. But throughout the game the Tigers moved the ball better on offence, finishing with 20 assists to Saint Mary's eight, and continually forced the Huskies into very difficult isolation shots on the other end.
Saint Mary's were led by Brown with 20 points, 12 rebounds and three steals, while Dalhousie's Carson went off for 29 points while hitting eight threes to earn Subway Player of the Game honours.
Dalhousie travels to St. Francis Xavier University on Saturday for a 6pm tipoff in their next game.
Next up for Saint Mary's, a visit from the University of Prince Edward Island on Saturday at 6pm.