California Baptist University is next on the list for the men’s basketball team after two big wins over the weekend.
The team has only had a two-game break since the last time Dixie State College faced Cal Baptist on Jan. 5.
DSC took a 69-57 win to the Lancers that Saturday evening as junior forward Dalton Groskreutz led the Storm with 17 points. Sophomore center Zach Robbins followed close behind Groskreutz with his fourth double-double with 15 points and 10 rebounds.
This game was CBU’s biggest loss of the season. The Lancers had one of its worst shooting nights shooting 37 percent from the field. Dixie completely broke the Lancers down with five players in double-figures.
The Red Storm go into the Cal Baptist game after a win against Azusa Pacific University on Saturday.
Forward Curtis Papenfuss, a junior Spanish major from Happy Valley, Ore., said the Azusa game could have been a let-down game because it was after a big 71-66 win against Grand Canyon University.
“A lot of times after you win a big game you have a let-down game, and Azusa is really good,” Papenfuss said. “Our goal was to win on Saturday and take it one game at a time.”
But the Storm stayed strong and came home with an 85-57 win.
Senior guard McKay Massey led the team with 16 points, and Robbins thrilled his hometown crowd with two alley-oop dunks that added to the Storm’s winning momentum.
DSC took control of the game early and went into the locker room with a 44-31 lead at half time and continued on to finish out the win.
Dixie had a challenging game on Thursday against Grand Canyon University where junior guard Kimball Payne led the team to a 71-66 win.
“The whole game they pressed us,” Papenfuss said. “Kimball Payne—I’ve never seen him play a better game. He played amazing. He really helped us break the pressure.”
The GCU game was an important game for DSC because Grand Canyon was on a 13-game winning streak, and the win would put Dixie in a better position to come out of the season on top.
“I thought it’d be a close game,” head coach Jon Judkins said. “Both teams do a good job. They run their stuff, they’re physical and they’re coached really well. I knew it was going to be a tough game…and we did a good job coming out in the second half in the first four minutes and took it to them.”
This win put DSC in a good position to be successful this season.
“You don’t want to lose on the Burns, so we’re undefeated here this year, and [Grand Canyon] was a huge win,” Papenfuss said.
The team keeps working on fundamentals as it faces each game of the season.
“We’re almost last in the league in offensive rebounding, so we’re really making an effort to crash on offensive boards and defensive ones also and not giving up opportunities,” Papenfuss said.
The Red Storm face Cal Baptist at the Burns Arena Saturday at 7:30 p.m.
