AUBURN — Not long after a sudden snow squall brought traffic to a halt in the Twin Cities area, the scoring ground to a halt inside Callahan Family Gymnasium.

St. Dom’s survived 16 percent shooting from the floor in the second half to pull out a 41-30 victory over Lisbon in Monday night’s Mountain Valley Conference tilt.

Kurt Johnson led all scorers with 13 points, while David Dean chipped in with 10 points for the Saints (2-2). Derick Lycette led Lisbon (0-4) with 12 points and eight rebounds, while Andrew MacDonnell added five points and nine boards.

Both teams shot 30 percent from the floor for the night, and St. Dom’s went more than eight minutes without scoring in the second half. But the Saints benefitted from 13 more field goal attempts and twice as many free throw attempts (10-5) thanks in large part to 28 Greyhound turnovers and their work on the offensive boards, which was led by Tom Applegate (12 rebounds, five offensive).

“We were stagnant in the second half offensively,” Saints coach Ryan Deschenes said. “The first half we came out having really good reads. We were spread out in our motion and having some good penetrations and kicks. Guys were getting lanes and attacking correctly. In the second half, we got away from that.”

Lisbon trailed by 14 early in the second half but couldn’t make much more of a dent in the deficit after Lycette hit back-to-back 3-pointers to make it 31-23 with 5:12 to go in the third quarter.

Johnson’s drive and bucket made it 35-24 with a little more than three minutes remaining. Mike Degou answered with a runner to make it a nine-point game heading into the fourth quarter.

The Saints missed their first eight shots of the final period, but Lisbon missed six of its first seven, and never got closer than seven points.

“Scoring 30 points isn’t going to win you a lot of games. It’s going to put you in the hole,” Lisbon coach Eric Hall said. “I went to the zone too late. I feel we should have gone to it in the third quarter.”

Lisbon’s tight 2-3 zone made things more difficult for the Saints down the stretch, and a jumper by Lycette pulled the Greyhounds within 35-28 with 4:55 remaining. But Dean finally broke the scoreless drought when he cut down the lane, took a pass from Joe Bryant (eight points, four steals) and laid it in to make it a nine-point game with 2:50 left.

“We had a little trouble getting into our set play. It was hard for us to adjust, but once we got it, we could break it a little bit,” Dean said. “I saw the lane and I took it. We had to move around more without the ball and attack the space when we had it.”

“David did a great job of  attacking the lanes,” Deschenes said. “He stepped up for us when we needed it tonight.”

Lisbon, playing without senior forward Tobey Harrington (out 4-6 weeks with broken ribs), turned the ball over six times in the first five minutes and Bryant drilled a couple of 3-pointers to send St. Dom’s to a 17-6 lead after one.

The Greyhounds shot 5-for-10 in the second quarter, but errors against the Saints full-court pressure kept them from making a substantial run.

“The 1-3-1, when we extended it, caused some confusion,” Deschenes said. “We got a lot of deflections that led to steals and led to points for us.”

“The turnovers are a killer,” Hall said. “Twenty-eight is a lot. That’s too much in a game where both teams are competitive and up until the last four minutes, the game could have gone either way.”

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