STERLING, Colo. – Jasiya DeOllos hit two free throws with 2.8 seconds left and Carl Thorpe stole a long pass as time was running out to give the Western Nebraska Community College men's basketball team a huge 69-67 win over Northeastern Junior College Tuesday evening in Sterling, Colorado, in a South Sub-region contest.
The win keeps the Cougars hope to host a first-round playoff game as they move to 15-11 overall and 4-6 in South Sub-region play.
WNCC is now tied for fourth in conference play with McCook Community College at 4-6 and they are just a half-game out of third, trailing Lamar Community College, who has a 4-5 sub-region record. The top team in the sub-region hosts the Region IX tournament and gets a bye while the next three teams host a first-round game the weekend of February 25 and 26.
The standings were made interesting on Tuesday as there were some big games, including Trinidad State College upending Otero College 100-87 and McCook taking out North Platte Community College 71-65.
WNCC has two regular season games left as they face Lamar on Thursday at Lamar, Colorado, in a big conference game. WNCC wraps up the regular season on Tuesday with they host North Platte at 6 p.m.
"This win was huge for our team," DeOllos said. "After dropping three straight, we needed to get back headed in the right direction and feel like tonight's win will give us some momentum to finish our last two regular season games."
A big reason for the win was the fight the Cougars put up on the road, especially late in the game.
"We were resillent," DeOllos said. "It wasn't the prettiest win but we got the job done. As a team, we could've thrown in the towel being down six with just a few minutes to go, but our team came together and did what needed to be done to get us back in the win column."
The first half was a back and forth 20 minutes as the teams were tied at 11-11 with 12;55 to play. WNCC had a 16-13 lead only to watch the Plainsmen come back to lead 33-31 late. WNCC rebounded and retook the lead on a Agwa Nywesh bucket. The Plainsmen answered to retake the lead by one. Rodney Sawyer came back down the court and hit a shot at the buzzer to give the Cougars the 36-35 halftime lead.
The second half saw NJC lead 43-40. WNCC scored seven straight to grab a 47-40 lead on five points from Sawyer. NJC bounced back to lead 50-47 and led by eight points with about five minutes to play at 63-55.
That was when the Cougars made a big run. Nywesh hit three straight buckets, including a big 3-pointer to bring the Cougars to within 65-62. NC answered with a bucket for a 67-62 lead. Sawyer hit a bucket to make it a 3-point game and then Thorpe hit a big 3-pointer with 55 seconds to play to tied the game at 67-67.
WNCC then played a strong defensive game holding NJC without making a bucket and getting some key rebounds. With under 30 seconds to play, WNCC had the ball and was working for a last second shot. The Cougars missed once, but got the rebound and missed another shot and the ball came back to DeOllos who tipped the ball up and was fouled as the ball hit the rim with 2.8 seconds to play.
NJC called two timeouts while DeOllos was at the foul line, but the Scottsbluff High graduate nailed both free throws to give the Cougars the 69-67 lead. NJC had trouble inbounding the ball and the Plainsmen had to call another timeout. This time they got the ball in to around the halfcourt line and the next pass the Plainsmen attempted went to the paint and Thorpe reached out and stole the ball and dribbled twice and the clock ran out giving the Cougars the win.
WNCC was led in scoring by Nywesh with 20 points, including four 3-pointers followed by Koang with 14 and Sawyer with 11.
WNCC (15-11) 36 33 – 69
NJC (8-16) 35 32 – 67
WNCC
Agwa Nywesh 20, Them Koang 14, Rodney Sawyer 11, Biko Johnson 6, Carl Thorpe 4, Carter Brown 7, Chancellor Johnson 3, Turumbil Zaki 2, Jasiya DeOllos 2.