Lady Indians post 48-43 tournament win over Lamar

The McCook Community College women’s basketball team opened up the Region IX tournament at home Friday with a 48-43 win over Lamar Community College.

“This time of year, you’re going to get everybody’s best basketball,” said MCC Coach Brandon Pritchett. “I’m proud of this team. The goal is to win by any means necessary and we gutted it out.”

Lamar had the chance to tie the game at 36-36 at the free-throw line with 8:11 left in the game but after the miss the Runnin’ Lopes never got any closer. Lamar went one-of-two at the free-throw line with 30.3 second remaining to pull within 45-43 but MCC connected on three of four free throws in the final 18.9 seconds of the game to pull out the win.

After not playing a game since Feb. 24, the Lady Indians came out with the first seven points of the game and led 15-5 after the first quarter.

“We came out really strong in the first quarter,” said Pritchett. “But you could tell we were rusty after a two-week layoff from game action and that showed in how we shot tonight,” said Pritchett.

Lamar regained momentum and outscored MCC 15-6 in the second quarter and trailed at the half 21-20

“We just weren’t as consistent after that first quarter, but we did enough in the second half,” said Pritchett. “Lamar made some timely shots.”

MCC got up 28-20 to start the second half but Lamar closed out the period on a 13-8 run and trailed after three quarters 36-33.

“We withstood the physicality and that’s something we haven’t done all year and we actually attacked and were aggressive and Lamar was physical with us and that’s what you should expect at tournament time,” said Pritchett.

Lamar outrebounded MCC 39-35. Both teams turned the ball over 23 times.

MCC outscored the Lopes 26-12 from the free-throw line.

Lamar was 12 of 20 from the line (60 percent) while MCC made 26 of 30 for the game and made 17 of 18 in the second half.

“We got to the free-throw line,” said Pritchett. “That’s one thing we did well.”

The Lady Indians shot 23.7 percent from the field and made just for of 16 shots beyond the 3-point line (25 percent).

Lamar shot 26.4 percent form the field and made three of 13 from distance (23 percent).

Sophomore Gemma Gruettner Bacoul (Berlin, Germany) led all scorers with 17 points including a nine-for-10 night at the free-throw line.

Sophomore Suzan Sisman (Aarhus, Denmark) scored 10 points and was five-for-six from the line and had six rebounds.

Noa Iglesias Chorda (sophomore Barcelona, Spain) also grabbed six rebounds. Freshman Madara Liepniece (Riga, Latvia) scored eight points off the bench.

“We have to clean some things up and work on some things but this was a great win for us and we’ll focus on the next stage and prepare for Casper on Thursday,” said Pritchett.

Lamar finishes the year 6-22.

The Lady Indians improve to 17-14.

MCC moves on to the second round in the tournament as the teams from the south face teams from the north. MCC seeded fourth in the south will take on top-seeded Casper (25-5) Thursday. Times and other pairings will be announced at a later date.

 

Women's Region IX Tournament
FRIDAY'S GAMES (South)
     McCook 48, Lamar CC 43 (at McCook)

     Western Nebraska 100, Trinidad State 51 (at Scottsbluff)

FRIDAY'S GAMES (North)
     Laramie County at Eastern Wyo., 5:30 p.m. (MT)
     Gillette at Northwest College at Gillette, 6 p.m. (MT)

 

Up-to-date information about MCC basketball including schedules, statistics, rosters and photos can be found on the MCC Athletics website, www.mccindians.com.