DAWSON – The Dawson-Boyd Blackjacks used a strong second half to pull away from the Renville County West Jaguars on Friday night. The Blackjacks outscored the Jaguars, 42-21 to pick up their fourth straight win, 74-46.

“I thought in the second half we had more transition baskets than we did in the first half,” Dawson-Boyd coach Cory Larson said. “We pushed the lead to 19 and they got it back to 13 we answered that with a nice run of our own. Part of that was just getting out and pushing the tempo and getting some easy ones.”

The most impressive thing about Dawson-Boyd’s second half is they did it without their floor leader in Alex Swenson. The senior guard suffered a shoulder injury when he landed on it going up for a layup with 7:39 left in the first half.

“That’s huge,” Larson said. “Alex is certainly our floor leader. He averages around 20 points a game. Plus he’s a solid defender and rebounder for you. I wasn’t sure how our kids were going to respond.”

Swenson opened the scoring by knocking down a jumper on Dawson-Boyd’s first possession. Swenson and Bentley Boike combined to score the team’s first 11 points.

When Swenson went down with a shoulder injury the Blackjacks held a 19-16 lead. Swenson knocked down a pair of free throws and then exited the game to get his shoulder looked at. Swenson briefly entered the game, but quickly exited as the Blackjacks took a 32-25 lead into the locker room.

The Jaguars opened the scoring in the second half to trim Dawson-Boyd’s lead to 32-27. The Blackjacks then answered by going on a 9-0 run to open up a 41-27 lead.

“Part of it was having a little patience,” Larson said. “There were some possessions out there that you’d probably refer to in not being patient. When you go on runs that means you’re knocking down shots. You have to share the basketball and find the open guys.”

A Jake Lee three-pointer put the Blackjacks up 50-34. A few moments later the Jaguars hit a three-pointer to cut Dawson-Boyd’s lead back to 13 points. The Blackjacks then followed with a 6-0 run to push their lead back to 56-34.

Dawson-Boyd took its biggest lead of the game off a Seth Stratmoen layup. Stratmoen was set up by a nifty pass from Lee to give the Blackjacks a 64-44 lead.

Romell Horton gave the Blackjacks a spark off the bench. Horton finished the game with a team-high 17 points, and did most of his damage in the second half filling in for Swenson.

“I’m pleased with the effort we got from Romell Horton,” Larson said. “He had an excellent second half. He moved into a situation where he was our primary ball handler. He played enough varsity basketball through five games here. We feel confident with him. He hasn’t been the sole primary ball handler. With Alex going down with a shoulder injury he had to shoulder that load. For the most part he did a pretty good job.”

Horton also dished out four assists and recorded three steals.

“It’s nice to have that luxury,” Larson said. “He’s a kid that can change the game just because of his skillset and his quickness. For him it’s about confidence and getting a feel for the game.”

Boike finished the game with 13 points and five rebounds. Before leaving the game with an injury Swenson scored 11 points. Lee finished with 10 points. Stratmoen finished with nine points and five rebounds/

With the win the Blackjacks improved to 4-1 and extended their winning streak to four games. They’ll be back in action on Tuesday against Lac qui Parle Valley.

“We want to set the tone with our defense,” Larson said. “We want to continue to sharpen things up offensively. We weren’t great offensively. We score 70 plus points and you think you had a great offensive night. A good chunk of that came from transition baskets there. We need to see the floor better. We see an action, but we’re not seeing the help, or the guy helping the helper. When we start to see the full picture I think things will open up even more for us offensively.”

RCW 25 21-46

DB 32 42-74

SCORING: DB (Horton 17; Boike 13; Swenson 11; Lee 10; Stratmoen 9; Joe Anyasike 6).

REBOUNDS: DB (Husby 8; Boike, Stratmoen Joe Anyasike 5).

ASSISTS: DB (Horton 4; Lee 3).

STEALS: DB (Husby 4).

BLOCKS: DB (Stratmoen 1).