ROSEMOUNT -- The Minnesota West Community and Technical College men's basketball team is in a better place.
With Wednesday's 70-65 victory over host Dakota County Technical College, the Bluejays recovered from their 100-64 loss at home against Mount Marty JV -- a game where they looked lost, at times, on both offense and defense. But Mount Marty had started its season more than a month before the Bluejays did, and they had already hit their stride. On Wednesday, the Bluejays were able to play two-year college in the same boat as themselves, and they took a big step toward gaining their own stride.
CJ Wright scored 19 points for West against Dakota County, and he got lots of help. Ty'Shawn Bryant and CJ Ligon both scored nine, and Isaac Ihnen and Dallas Williams both scored seven. Jacquez Stoudemire scored eight. Another Jay, Keitric Barber, had 10 rebounds to go along with six points.
As a team, West out-rebounded Dakota County 42-41. What's more, the Jays committed only nine turnovers.
Manny Montgomery and Ahmad Berry each scored 18 points for the home team.
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Minnesota West head coach Taylor Lupton described his team's man-to-man defensive efforts as "pretty solid." Offensively, the Jays hit just 19 percent of their 3-point attempts, but on the plus side, they had a lot of good looks.
"I think it was a very good bounce-back game for us," Lupton said. "We look forward to going into Saturday's game against Rochester."
The Rochester game is on the road again, in a 2 p.m. start.
Minnesota West 41 70
Dakota County 35 65
