By By BRUCE HIXON Sports Editor
One win hardly makes the Jefferson Davis Community College Warhawks a contender for the Alabama Community College Conference championship.
On the other hand, Tuesday's 101-82 road victory over Marion Military Institute was a step in the right direction.
"It's real tough to win on the road in our conference so anytime you get one, it's pretty big," JDCC coach Allen Gainer said. "I've always felt the key to winning our conference was to win all your home games and win at least half your road games."
In addition to the importance of Tuesday's contest being a conference game, the victory was JDCC's third straight and moved the Warhawks to within a game of the .500 mark at 6-7.
"Not that we're satisfied with the .500 mark, but getting back there with a win Saturday (at home against Gadsden State) would be big step in the right direction considering where we once were," Gainer said.
The Warhawks got off to a bit of a slow start, but managed to take a 31-22 lead halfway through the first half. They maintained that nine-point edge at 53-44 at half-time. Greg Dickinson was a big part of that, as 15 of his 26 points came in the first half.
Yet it was three straight three-pointers by Dickinson in the second half that enabled the Warhawks to pull away. JDCC had a 48-38 scoring edge in the second half.
"I was concerned with how we would play because we had been off since December 12. We had a couple of good practices when we came back from break, but then the quality of those practices started to go down. Then we came out pretty sluggish with little intensity to start the game. It was probably a lot closer than it should have been in the first half before we picked things up," Gainer said.
In addition to the 26 points from Dickinson, JDCC also got 24 from Norvell "Junior" Coleman. Jeff Foster and Brandon Montgomery each had 14, while Randall Burno also reached double figures with 11.
"Greg and had a big game and Junior made his normal contributions, but overall we had good balance in our attack. Five players in double
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figures is evidence of that,"
The Warhawks, who hosted Gadsden State Saturday, will host ACCC rival Enterprise Monday at 7 p.m.
At Marion
JDCC 53 48 – 101
Marion MI 44 38 – 82
JDCC (2FG-3FG-FT-TP) Dickinson 5-5-1-26; Coleman 10-0-4-24; Foster 2-2-4-14; Montgomery 5-0-4-14; Burno 5-0-1-11; Hobbs 1-1-2-7; Drakeford 1-0-0-2; Madison 1-0-0-2; Thompson 0-0-1-1 (Totals: 30-8-17-101)
MARION MILITARY INSTITUTE (2FG-3FG-FT-TP) Nichols 7-0-11-25; Watterson 4-3-4-21; Quiterder 3-2-2-14; Newman 0-2-3-9; Barton 2-1-1-8; Nida 0-1-0-3; Woods 0-0-2-2 (Totals: 16-9-23-82)