[1-19-2013] The Western
Nebraska Community College men’s basketball team lost another heartbreaker
Saturday afternoon, falling to Otero Junior College 100-93 in overtime at Cougar
Palace.
It
was the teams’ fourth overtime loss in the last eight games. Trey Moore, who finished
with nine points and eight assists, said the team competed hard to tie the game
at 82-82 to force overtime, but they just need to learn to finish.
“We
played hard but it is our fourth overtime loss and I was pretty sure that we
would have won one sometime,” Moore said. “It was big of us to come back, but
we have to finish the game. “
The
way the Cougars came back to force overtime was thrilling. The Cougars didn’t
take their first lead of the contest until the 13:14 mark of the second half on
a Charles Ward bucket. The Cougars were then down by as much as five points on
different occasions with a minute to play when things started to turn their
way.
Ward
was the catalyst of the comeback as he hit a 3-pointer off an inbounds play to
slice the lead to 80-78. Moments later, Ward stole the ball and dunked home the
tying bucket. Otero came back and went ahead 82-80 with 21.3 seconds to play on
two free throws by Yoshio Allen. WNCC answered as Tahir Little found a small
gap underneath the bucket with 9.4 seconds to play to tie the game at 82-82.
Otero
had a chance to win it at the end of regulation but the Cougars came through
with two blocks to force the extra period.
Moore
said the way the team came back, never giving up after the Rattlers opened the
game with five straight 3-pointers, shows a lot of heart with this team.
“Those
blocks were a big momentum changer because they still had time so we couldn’t
celebrate after Ty made that shot. We got back and got the stop and send it
into overtime,” Moore said. “We just need to get over that hump and come
together as a team and make some shots in overtime.”
The Cougars
were led in scoring by Ward with 37 points. Ward was 10 of 11 from the field,
including four 3-pointers. WNCC also saw Quante Cooley finish with 16 points
and 11 rebounds, while Cody Johnson has 12 points.
The
Cougars did out-rebound the Rattlers 40-39 and also dished out 26 assists.
Little led the team in assists with nine followed by Moore with eight.
The
sub-region heart-breaking loss drops the team to 1-3 in the south sub-region,
but they still are not out of a top finish for the regional tournament as they
have plenty of sub-region games left.
“We
still can win sub-regions with three losses, so we have to take it one game at
a time,” Moore said. “We have to just get over that hump, dig deep and just
keep going. We battled the whole game out there today, but we just have to
finish games.”
Still,
it is vital that that Cougars learn to close out a game. Look at it this way,
if the Cougars would have won the four overtime games, their 7-10 record would
be 11-6. On top of everything, the road doesn’t get any easier as they host
Eastern Wyoming on Tuesday in another sub-region contest.
“We
will get rested up with our Sunday break and then come back Monday, practice
hard and prepare for them,” Moore said. “We don’t want another loss at home.”
Tuesday’s
home contest begins at 7:30 p.m. and after that, the Cougars won’t be home
again until Feb. 8-9 against Lamar Community College and Northeastern Junior
College.
Otero 41
41 18 –100
WNCC 36
46 11 – 93
OTERO
Chris Golden 17, Perryonte Smith 13, Kentwan Smith 17,
Terrel Brown 10, Andre Reider 15, Alex Padgett 6, Yoshio Allen 20, Daniel Hield
2.
WNCC
Tahir Little 7, Zach Clemens 4, Quante Cooley 16, Trey
Moore 9, Charles Ward 37, Cody Johnson 12, Youssoupha Kane 6, Chad Calcaterra
2.
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