The Cougar women, who opened the second semester with a 74-41 win against Lamar Community College on Friday, watched the Otero team get the better of them on Saturday, falling 65-51. Tuesday night, the Cougar women will be looking to get back on the winning track with a 5:30 p.m. tip off.
The Cougar men, 14-4 and winners of 11 of their last 13, will face off against Casper at 7:30 p.m. It is also Runza Seat Cushion night as well.
Women’s basketball coach Dave Harnish said the Casper game is important for the Cougars in a couple reasons, as they hope to gain some momentum heading into an even bigger sub-region contest against Northeast (Neb.) Community College on Saturday on the road.
“It is a big week for us,” he said. “Casper used to be the important game and now Saturday’s game at Norfolk is big because it is a sub-region game and the winner can host the regional tournament. So, it is important for us to play well [Tuesday] night and carry that momentum and some confidence going into this weekend.”
Tuesday’s contest definitely won’t be easy against a 17-4 Casper team that is averaging 79.2 points a game. Last week, the T-birds disposed of Northwest Wyoming 73-46 and then topped Central Wyoming 99-67. Against Central Wyoming, Emily Elliott netted 18 points and Megan House, a Southeast Goshen graduate, poured in 16 points.
Harnish said his team will have to play well on both ends of the court in order for them to capture their 15th win of the season.
“The importance of this game has changed a little bit. I would say they were our biggest rivals over the last 15 years or so and both teams always play well when we were in the Central Sub-region,” Harnish said. “The difference this year is they have a new coach and in terms of what they do will be different. We know their strength is three-point shooting and that is something we will have to do and that is to eliminate the threes.
“But, we have only played two games [this semester] and it is more important for us to do some things better than we did last weekend, including playing better defensively and executing out there offensively. Really, it is what we do and not worry so much about Casper.”
In Saturday’s setback to Otero, WNCC had control of the game until late when the team went in a scoring laurel.
“I thought we played and executed real well against Lamar and, for the most part, I thought we played well against Otero,” Harnish said. “We were up one with about seven minutes left in the game and then we hit a laurel and had a couple of defensive mistakes. I thought overall we played well. We just seemed to run out of gas and that is expected after a month off.”
WNCC trailed 30-29 at halftime with Tawny Drexler scoring all of her nine points in the first half. The Cougars then scored just 22 points in the second half. The big difference in the contest was fouls and free-throw shooting. WNCC was just 11 of 24 from the charity stripe while Otero was 15 of 23.
Shaquilah Davis paced the Cougars with 13 points followed by Drexler with nine and Stormye Everett with eight.
Harnish said having those two games under their belts should help them in this week’s contests.
“We have only been back seven or eight days and it is tough to get our legs back,” he said. “Any time you play at home you get a little bit more rest. It is always important to play well at home and the kids always enjoy playing on the home court and in front of their own fans. That is what it is all about, having the home court advantage and hopefully we will have a good crowd and hope the enthusiasm is there both on the court and in the crowd.”
While the women’s team will be looking get back on the winning track, the men’s team is hoping to stay on the winning side after topping a good Lamar Community College team 89-75 on Friday for their 15th win of the season against a Casper team that has struggled at times, but have plenty of talent.
It is also important for the Cougar men to play well heading into this weekend’s road sub-region contest against Northeast Nebraska Saturday afternoon.
WNCC (14-4) 29 22 – 51
Otero (14-4) 30 35 – 65
WESTERN NEBRASKA
Lorena Medeiros 5, SeLina Ysac 3, Shaquilah Davis 13, Stormye Everett 8, Janae Willis 3, Tawny Drexler 9, Caley Fisher 3, Juliana Bassetto 7.
No comments:
Post a Comment