Basketball Preview: Aquinas Monarchs vs. Howells-Dodge Jaguars
Aquinas and Howells-Dodge are an even 5-5 against one another since December of 2014, but not for long. The Aquinas Monarchs will square off against the Howells-Dodge Jaguars on Tuesday. Hopefully Aquinas focused on turnovers this week as the team gave up six on Saturday.
Last Saturday, Aquinas was able to grind out a solid win over Logan View/Scribner-Snyder, taking the game 59-48. The victory made it back-to-back wins for the Monarchs.
Aquinas' success was spearheaded by the efforts of Bryant Stouffer, who dropped a double-double on 26 points and 13 rebounds, and Garett Novacek, who went 8 for 13 en route to 21 points plus five rebounds and two blocks. The dominant performance also gave Novacek a new career-high in threes (five). Another player making a difference was Kailer Pohl, who scored six points.
Meanwhile, you can't lose the matchup if you win every quarter, and that was precisely Howells-Dodge's strategy against Wakefield on Saturday. Given that consistent dominance, it should come as no surprise that Howells-Dodge blew Wakefield out of the water with a 70-29 final score. The game was all but wrapped up at the end of the third, by which point the Jaguars had established a 39 point advantage.
Aquinas' victory ended a five-game drought on the road dating back to last season and puts them at 2-0. As for Howells-Dodge, their win bumped their record up to an identical 2-0.
Aquinas came up short against Howells-Dodge in their previous meeting back in December of 2023, falling 46-34. Thankfully for Aquinas, Oscar Dominguez (who shot 4-for-5 from long range and dropped a double-double on 22 points and 11 rebounds) won't be suiting up this time. Will that be enough to change the final result? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
