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VICKSBURG — Dowagiac ran into a hot-shooting Vicksburg squad and dropped its boys’ basketball opener on the road 76-47 Tuesday. 

Darium Hunt’s Chieftains are now 0-1. Vicksburg improves to 2-0, including a decisive 72-54 win over Monday over Wolverine Conference foe Otsego. 

Vicksburg hustled out to a quick 11-0 lead to start the non-league contest. Chase Frazier’s layup gave Dowagiac its first basket nearly four minutes into the game and the Chieftains trailed the Bulldogs 26-11 at the end of one quarter. 

The Bulldogs’ transition game led to several fast-break buckets and at times it seemed like the home team just couldn’t miss a shot in the first half. 

Vicksburg outscored Dowagiac 27-12 in the second quarter and built its advantage to 30-points, 53-23, by halftime. 

Vicksburg, which knocked down 23-of-39 shots from the floor in the opening half, outscored Dowagiac 11-6 in the third stanza to build a commanding 64-29 advantage entering the fourth quarter.

The Bulldogs finished the night shooting 33-of-55 from the floor (60 percent) and 8-of-12 (67 percent) at the foul stripe. 

“Vicksburg shot the ball very well and against a team like that you can’t afford to dig yourself the kind of hole that we did to start things off. They got in a good rythmn immediately. We were contesting their shots but there’s not much you can do when they are falling,” Hunt said.”Our kids began to relax a bit more in the second half and began to let the offense come to them.”

Vicksburg also owned a decisive 34-21 rebounding advantage against Dowagiac.

Balanced scoring was a big factor for the Bulldogs as well with three players reaching double digits, including 20 points apiece from senior Jordan Diekman and junior Mitchell Beyer, while Anthony Marchese added 14 and Lucas Johnson seven. 

Marchese also had six rebounds and Diekman added six boards to go with four assists.

Dowagiac was led in scoring by Isaiah Fitchett with 27 points, including five three pointers. The Chieftains’ 6-foot-0 guard/forward made all four of his free-throw attempts as well. 

“Isaiah shot the ball really well for us tonight. He knocked down a few threes for us too,” Hunt added.

Jamal Williams and Frazier both added six points each for Dowagiac and Brayden Diaz finished with five.

Hunt was also pleased with what he saw out of some of his younger players on his roster that he was able to rotate into the ballgame.

“I have five returners but I was able to get some of the younger guys some experience tonight. We will keep working and its early in the season. I believe with hard work we will get where we want to be with this group,” Hunt added.

Small, a member of the Basketball Coaches of Michigan’s Hall of Fame after winning two state championships at Schoolcraft, was pleased with his team’s performance. 

“We want to see if we can play fast, but if we can’t we will slow things down. Right now we have to get better in our half-court game. The kids are working hard and we shot the ball very well tonight, especially in the first half. We are learning to play the game better fundamentally. I thought our length caused Dowagiac some problems on the glass tonight,” Small said.