WICHITA, Kan. – The Newman men's basketball team used a strong finish Saturday afternoon (Jan. 26) picking up a huge conference win over Dallas Baptist, 79-72. The Jets improve to 14-5 on the year, moving to 5-2 in the Heartland while the Patriots drop to 13-7 on the season and fall to 5-2 in Heartland play.
It was the Juwan Davenport show in the opening minutes of the game as he scored the first five points for the Jets. But four turnovers led to a 6-0 Patriots run and 6-5 lead at the first media timeout.
The game turned into a series of runs after the first media timeout. The Jets opened up a 7-0 run after DBU went to a zone defense. The Patriots countered back with an 8-3 run of their own and the game was tied 17-17 going into the under eight minute media timeout.
Out of the media timeout the Patriots defense collected three straight turnovers leading to a 9-2 run forcing Newman to burn a quick timeout as DBU pulled out to their largest lead of the game 29-19.
Senior, Christian DeYoung caught fire out of the timeout knocking down back-to-back triples cutting the DBU lead down to four with just under five-minutes left in the half. The Jets' offense continued to stay red hot closing the half on a 14-1 run taking a 33-30 lead into the break. Both teams shot nearly the exact same with the only difference being that DBU made one less shot. Newman went 11-25 (5-12) while the Patriots shot 10-25 (5-12.)
After a 43-43 tie with just under-14 minutes left in the game, Davenport continued to guide the Newman offense scoring four straight during a 5-0 run, putting the Jets back ahead 48-43.
Just before the halfway point in the second half, Newman used a 7-0 run over a four minute span taking the lead for the final time in the game.
The Patriots continued to cut the Jets lead down to one possession four different times, but Newman continued to make big time shots on the backs of Davenport and senior guard Ben Ayre. The Jets converted on their final six free-throw attempts securing a big conference win 77-72.
Juwan Davenport carried the load scoring a game high 25 points in 34 minutes played. Christian DeYoung and Tim Troussell each added in 11 points.
The Jets will try to stay hot in conference play as they travel to Lubbock Christian on Thursday (Jan. 31) at 8:00 p.m.
