STERLING, Colo. – The Western Nebraska Community College men's basketball team had an opportunity to win the South Sub-region on Saturday, but the Northeastern Junior College Plainsmen had other ideas as NJC shot over 50 percent from the field and 3-point arc to claim the 111-100 win over WNCC.

                The loss by WNCC gives Trinidad State College the conference title and the first-round bye into the Region IX tournament March 13-15 at Gillette, Wyoming. WNCC finished second with a 7-5 record and will host a first-round game on Saturday when they battle McCook Community College at 3 p.m. with the winner advancing to the tournament.

                Other first-round games that are scheduled so far include Otero at North Platte, NJC at Lamar, Central Wyoming at Northwest, Laramie County at Western Wyoming, and Eastern Wyoming at Casper. These games will all be played Saturday with the winners advancing to the regional tournament.

                For the Cougars, they were with NJC for the first part of the first half on Saturday. WNCC led 13-10 on an Elijah Burney bucket and the score tied at 19-19 on two Mathiang Maker free throws.

                After that, NJC went on a 20-6 run to lead 39-25. WNCC rallied late in the first half, slicing the deficit to just seven, 47-40 on four Maker buckets and trailed 49-41 at intermission.

                WNCC opened the second half with seven straight points to make it a 2-point contest, 49-47. NJC would change the momentum as they went on an 18-0 run to lead 67-47 before Kellon Harris stopped the run with a bucket with 13:23 to play.

                NJC continued with another 7-0 run for the 74-49 lead. NJC had a 25-2 run during that stretch. WNCC tried coming back late as they got the deficit down to single digits at 101-92, but that was as close as they could get.

                WNCC was led in scoring my Maker and Burney with 27 points each. Maker went 9-of-12 from the free throw line while Burney had four 3-pointers and also went 9-of-12 from the charity stripe.

                WNCC had three others in double figures as Elijah Hollins had 11 points while Harris and St. Preux each had 10 points.    

WNCC                41 59 – 100
NJC                   49 62 – 111
WNCC
Kellon Harris 10, Elijah Hollins 11, Mathiang Maker 27, Elijah Burney 27, Toms Linis 9, Noah Jones 2, Isaiah St. Preux 10, Dorin Nguema 4.