Dawson County has a strangle hold over Union County. The Tigers defeated Union for the ninth consecutive time last Friday night in Blairsville. Behind the great offensive performance by Stephen Scaife and Tyler Dominy, with 26 and 25 points respectively, the Tigers captured a 66-46 win over their archrivals Union County.

“We played one of our better games,” said Head Coach Thad Burgess.

“It was a very important win to assure us that we don’t have to have a play-in game at the region tournament. Stephen and Tyler had a big night for us. For Tyler, who is a freshman, to score 25 points on the road, was really big. I just knew Tyler would continue to improve and mature through the year.”

The Tigers trailed after one quarter, 11-9, but the Dawson offense came alive in the second quarter and outscored the Panthers 21-8 to take a 30-19, halftime lead.

Burgess’ team put the game out of reach in the third quarter.

The Tigers scored a whooping 24 points to Union’s 13, to take a 54-32 advantage. Dawson used its delay game in the final quarter to capture the victory.

Burgess said of his team’s domination over Union County the last four years: “It has been really special to be able to keep the streak alive against Union, because that was the program that was on top of the region several years ago.

Winning at Union four straight years is very tough.”

Also scoring for Dawson County were Levi Wilson with six points, Jacob Evans and Stephen Johnson added three points each, and Logan Lewis scored two points.

Seth Merritt led Union with 16 points.

The Tigers are currently 17-6 on the season.

Dawson will play host to Rabun County this Friday for senior night.

The Wildcats defeated Dawson 65-57 a couple of weeks ago in Tiger. Tip-off for the Rabun game will be at 8:30 p.m.