Indians fall to Eastern Florida State in tourney
TWIN FALLS, Idaho – The McCook Community College men’s basketball team lost to Eastern Florida State Thursday 111-101 in the opening game of the Battle of The Boot Tournament hosted by College of Southern Idaho.
“Obviously this was not the outcome we wanted,” said MCC Coach Dillon Hargrove. “But this was a national tournament-like game and Eastern Florida is a national-tournament-type team, ranked top 25 in the country in the media poll.”
MCC held a 51-49 lead at intermission but was outscored 62-50 over the final 20 minutes by the Titans. After making six of 10 triples in the first half, the Indians slumped to four of 15 makes from the 3-point line in the second half (26.7 percent). EFS held the advantage on the glass 53-33 leading to a 31-10 edge on second chance points.
“Offensively I think we played really well, anytime you score 101, there’s no issue there,” said Hargrove. “Defensively, we gave up too many offensive rebounds and straight-line drives.”
MCC scored the first three points of the contest, but EFS went on an 11-0 run to lead 11-3 at the 15:34 mark of the first half. The Indians responded with an 8-0 run over the next 1:43 to tie the game 11-11 at the 13:51 mark. Neither team was able to take control until MCC took a 26-25 lead at the 8:17 mark and took its largest lead of the game 39-33 at the 5:22 mark of the first half.
The Titans shot 52.6 percent from the field for the game, made 8 of 30 triples (26.7 percent) and went 21 of 32 from the free-throw line 65.6 percent.
“I’m proud of how we fought, I mean giving up 21 offensive rebounds and still having a chance to win the game at the end, that takes a lot of fight,” said Hargrove.
MCC shot 47.9 percent from the floor, 40 percent from distance (10 of 25) and went 23 of 36 from the line (63.9 percent).
Sophomore point guard Nate Coley (Little Rock, Ark.) paced the MCC offense with a team-high 24 points along with five assists and four steals. Freshman Djibril Diawara (Aulnay-sous-Bois, France) scored 24 points and made six of 13 triples.
Sophomore transfer Mo Diao (Darkar, Senegal) scored 19 points and led MCC with nine rebounds. He was seven of 12 from the field and made five of seven free throws. Sophomore transfer Lukas Gudavicius, (Palanga, Lithuania) scored six points with six boards and freshman Sofiane Benragba (Montpellier, France) came off the bench to score nine points.
Eastern Florida State improves to 2-0 on the season, having downed Indian River State College (Florida) 97-80 on opening-night. MCC goes to 2-1 on the year.
“We’re glad to play a game like this in November, because this will set us up to be successful in March, which is the ultimate goal,” said Hargrove. “We’re going to fix some things and get ready for another big matchup tomorrow.”
MCC and E. Florida State are two of the six teams representing six states in the Battle of The Boot. Other schools in the tournament include: Clarendon College, Texas (1-0); Columbia Basin, Washington (0-0); Casper (0-1) and Western Wyoming (1-0); and the two Idaho schools, College of Southern Idaho (2-0) and North Idaho (0-0).
MCC moves to the consolation round of the tournament and will play Casper College Friday at 1 p.m. The Thunderbirds lost their first-round game against North Idaho 98-94. Other first-round games Thursday night included Clarendon College vs. Columbia Basin and College of Southern Idaho vs. Western Wyoming.
Up-to-date information about MCC men’s basketball including livestream links for home games, schedule, statistics, rosters, photos and more can be found on the MCC Athletics website, www.mccindians.com