by Alan Hoskins, KCKCC
Idle three
weeks for the holiday break, Kansas City Kansas Community College men’s
basketball team will return
to action in a rush – six games in 11 days heading into Jayhawk Conference
play.
The Blue Devils (4-10) resume
play against Northern Oklahoma (9-5) in Tonkawa Tuesday at 4 p.m. before playing
host to four of the next five games. Highlighting the remaining non-conference
games will be the Blue Devil Classic, a four-team event Friday and Saturday.
Fort Scott (9-8) will open the
Classic against Metropolitan Community College Friday at 5:30 p.m. with KCKCC as
host of On Point Academy at 7:30 p.m. Three games will be played Saturday. Fort
Scott will play On Point Academy at 2 p.m.; the KCKCC women will play McCook
(Nebraska) at 4 p.m. and the Blue Devils will take on Metropolitan at 6 p.m.
The Blue Devils will then close
out non-conference play, facing North Central Missouri on the road Jan. 14 and
then entertain Saint Mary junior varsity Jan. 17 and Park University junior
varsity Jan. 18 before opening Jayhawk play with a home game against Labette
Jan. 23.
The busy non-conference schedule
will give coach Kelley Newton a chance to fine tune the Blue Devils for conference
play.
“Our focus will be the same,
getting better position by position day by day,” Newton said. “We have a lot of
young players (nine freshmen) and will try to match up against whomever we
play.” An extremely balanced 13-man squad, nine Blue Devils have started three
games or more.
Jalen Davis, a 6-2 freshman guard
from Houston, is the lone Blue Devil scoring in double figures. Shooting a
torrid 56.5 percent from the field, Davis is averaging 12.3 points per game.
Another frosh, 6-2 Calvin Slaughter of Macon, Georgia, is next at 9.4 followed
by 6-5 sophomore Arother Ratliff (7.5) of Glenwood, Mississippi, and 6-6
freshman Daiyon Taylor (6.5) of Detroit.
There’s a log jam of four players
grouped at 5.4 points a game – sophomores DuVonte’ Beard of Belton and Malcolm
Tate of Wichita South and freshmen Kelyn Bolton of Shawnee Mission East and
Johnathan Richmond of Columbia (Missouri) Hickman.
Freshmen Cody Dortch of
Paragould, Arkansas, and Andre Boykins of Washington, D.C., are both averaging
4.5 followed by freshman Taylor Turner (3.7) of Albuquerque, New Mexico, and
sophomore Tama Johnson (2.7) of Schlagle.
Daiyon Taylor (4.1), Beard (4.0)
and Slaughter (3.8) lead in rebounding while Bolton leads in assists with 3.2
per contest.
Defensively, the Blue Devils rank
No. 9 nationally at 69.1 points a game which is far and away the best in the
Jayhawk.
“We pride ourselves defensively,
especially the way we finished the first half of the season,” Newton said. “We
just need to turn our defense into more offense, stopping other teams from
making big runs and putting ourselves in position to go on our own runs. It’s
hard when you play good defense and are not rewarded with points.”
Unbeaten Highland has emerged as
the Jayhawk Conference favorite. With a 16-0 start, the Scotties are ranked No.
3 in the NJCAA Division II poll. Johnson County is 12-3 followed by Labette and
Hesston, both at 9-7; and Fort Scott at 9-8.
“It’s no secret Highland has the
pieces on the floor and is very good,” Newton said. “Johnson County has had
some real good wins. Labette plays very hard and is a tough out. Fort Scott
finally got healthy. This is my sixth season and we’re in one of the toughest
conferences for a reason. There’s no easy game anywhere and anyone can be
beaten on any one night.”
