The Cougars, who are on a 6-game winning streak, open the Classic against Gillette College. The Pronghorns are 6-1 in their inaugural season in Region IX and bring a talented team to Cougar Palace, under the direction of former Miles Community College coach Shawn Neary. WNCC will also face Central Community College-Columbus on Saturday. Both WNCC contests tip off at 7 p.m.
The Eastern Wyoming College Lancers will also be taking part in the Thanksgiving Classic as they look for their second win of the season. The Lancers will open Friday against Central-Columbus, and then Gillette on Saturday. The Lancers’ contests tip off at 4:30 p.m.
WNCC coach Russ Beck said this will be a challenging tournament.
“Gillette is a very athletic team. They have a small point guard that drives to get into the paint,” he said. “They also have several guys about 6-3 and 6-5 that do a really good job of attacking the offensive glass. They prefer to play an up-tempo game. They are well coached and Shawn Neary had a lot of success at Miles, and he had a year to prepare this team for this inaugural season. In terms of Central-Columbus, we really haven’t had a chance to see them play. Both teams will present us with a good challenge and that is what you want, to play teams that will be able to test us.”
WNCC enters the home Classic with plenty of confidence. Since the Cougars suffered a season-opening loss to College of Eastern Utah, they have rebounded with six straight wins, while averaging over 85 points a contest. The Cougars have 97 points in wins against Colorado Northwestern and the Pac West All-stars.
Beck said that season-opening did wonders for the team.
“That loss showed that our emphasize has to be defense and to be able to hold teams down of what they like to score on average,” he said. “I think we have pulled together as a group. I was glad we played a good team right off the bat because it let us know where we were at. The kids responded well and worked hard in practice. With the adversity that we had when Scott [Bamforth] got injured, it allowed other guys to step up. I think the chemistry is starting to develop with this team.”
On top of the six-game winning streak, the Cougars are starting to make some noise on the national seen. The Cougars received votes in this week’s NJCAA national poll. The last time the Cougar men received national poll recognition was back in 2005 when the Cougars were No. 1 in the nation for three weeks, under the direction of former coach Ron Brillhart. WNCC finished the regular season ranked No. 14 with a 25-4 record.
Beck said this team is deserving of the national recognition and the program is headed in the right direction.
“The polls start to shake out as the time goes on and I thought we played three really challenging games, two games against Eastern Utah College and the Air Force Prep team,” he said. “We presented ourselves with early challenges, but it allows us to grow. This is where I thought we would be after seven games. It is nice to be receiving votes, but at the same time we can’t constantly be looking at the polls. Hopefully we can handle business this weekend and those polls take care of themselves.”
The team is excited to be playing in front of the Cougar fans and to show them how much they have improved from the season-opening 77-61 loss to Eastern Utah on Nov. 3.
“We are excited to back at home. We have six wins now and none of them have been at home,” Beck said. “We really didn’t play our best basketball in our season opener and that was the only opportunity for people to see us play. We would like to play well at home to show people what we are capable of and let the people know we are a team that people can get behind and be proud of. We are excited to be going after our first wins on our home floor.”
After this weekend, the Cougars will be at home for a single game on Tuesday when they host Lamar Community College, the defending Region IX champions. WNCC will then be on the road for a tournament in Sheridan, Wyo., before taking three weeks off before returning to action Dec. 29-31 at the Indian Hills New Year’s Eve Tournament in Ottumwa, Iowa.
Other Notes:
* There will also be Turkey Bowling during both night’s of the Thanksgiving Classic at halftime of the men’s game. Individuals can win Turkeys by knocking down pins in a bowling competition. Saturday’s promotion will be trading card night where the first 150 Cougar fans will receive one trading card of a Cougar men’s basketball player.
*WNCC men’s basketball players Francisco Cruz and Geddes Robinson are making some noise in the national statistics. Cruz, a sophomore, is 16th in scoring, averaging 21 points a game. Robinson, a sophomore, is 33rd in scoring (18.4 points), 33rd in rebounding (9.2 rebounds), and 16th in field goal percentage.
*The Cougar women will also be in action this weekend as they travel to Garden City, Kan., to face Garden City and Seward County. The No. 10 Cougars are also 6-1 on the season after dropping their first game of the season last weekend to Nov. 4 Midland College.
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