Saints and Lady Saints Dominant in Dodge City

Saturday night the Seward County Lady Saints and Saints traveled to Dodge City to play in the United Wireless Arena for the first time ever. Both teams left the arena with smiles on their faces with their 5th straight wins to both remain in the race atop the Jayhawk West Conference standings.
The Lady Saints got things going in a tough matchup against a Dodge City team struggling at the bottom of the standings, with three big contests against league title contenders for Seward on the horizon in the next two weeks. It was a slow start for both teams and Seward led just 12-6 midway through the first half. The Lady Saints got things going to close the half while Dodge City certainly did not. Seward led at the break 32-12 while holding the Lady Conquistadors to just four first half field goals. Ricquia Jones outscored Dodge City by 5 by herself in the first 20 minutes with a 17 point half. Seward opened it up to as many as 37 points in the second half before coasting to the finish line in a 71-45 win. Jones led Seward with 19 points while Madison McLain posted her second double double of the season against Dodge City with 14 points and 10 rebounds.
The Saints hit the court Saturday as the top dogs in the Jayhawk West after a pair of Hutchinson losses in the past week to draw the teams even in the standings at 10-2. It was a back and forth first half for the two teams as they took turns trading early leads before the Saints grabbed onto the lead and took a 34-31 lead into the break. Dodge City hung around with Seward early in the second half but the Saints used a 15-3 spurt midway through the period to put the game away for good. Seward opened its lead to 72-51 late in the half and after Dodge made one last push to make the score respectable, a pair of late Leslee Smith one handed slams put an exclimation mark on a 79-64 Saints win. Seward shot 65% in the victory while holding Dodge City to just 34% from the floor. Kaheem Ransom had a game high 22 points for the Saints while Edson Avila scored 18 on 9 of 11 shooting and Smith scored 13 on 6 of 6 from the floor.
The Lady Saints improve to 19-7 overall and 10-3 in Jayhawk West play with three games to go. Seward takes over 3rd place in the conference standings to themselves with a Garden City win over Cloud County and remains just 1/2 game back of the Lady Broncbusters, their opponent on Wednesday in the Greenhouse.
The Seward Men remain deadlocked with Hutchinson atop the standings at 11-2 while they pick up their 20th win of the season at 20-7, tying an all time record with the programs 6th straight 20 win campaign.
Seward hosts Garden City Wednesday and the Bank of Beaver City is the buyout sponsor. The games air on B107.5 and kscbnews.net.