Lady Indians bow to Plainswomen 71-53

Trailing by two after the first quarter the Northeastern Junior College women outscored McCook Community College 42-21 over the second and third quarters and topped the Lady Indians 71-53 Saturday at the Peter and Dolores Graff Events Center.

Eight sophomores were honored prior to the game: Laia Izquierdo Altimira (Barcelona, Spain); Peyton Cox (Wauneta-Palisade High School); Johanna Gerlach (Hachborn, Germany); Jacelyn Jorgensen (Paxton); Jada Kemm (Henderson, Colo.); Carolina Garcia Perdomo (Islas Canarias, Spain); Brylyn Springer (Cambridge) and Miriam Wahlqvist (Helsingborg, Sweden).

The Lady Indians came out and led 12-10 after one quarter.

“We played well for one quarter and we just didn’t show up after that, until maybe the last five minutes of the game,” said MCC Coach Brandon Pritchett.

NJC outscored MCC 18-10 in the second quarter, led at half 28-22 and dominated MCC 24-11 in the third quarter to take the drama out of the game, leading 52-33.

Shooting statistics were not available immediately after the game. NJC made eight 3-pointers in the game and made 14 of 18 free throws (77.8 percent) and had 12 turnovers.

“Credit to NJC I thought they did a really nice job of shooting the ball and making plays,” said Pritchett. “We just did not make plays tonight. Whatever could go wrong, did go wrong.”

MCC made five 3-pointers in the game, went 11 of 14 from the free-throw line (70 percent), and outrebounded NJC 29-23. The Lady Indians turned the ball over 23 times.

“We can’t have that turnover rate at this point in the season,” said Pritchett. “That’s the bottom line. Take care of the ball.”

Izquierdo Altimira led MCC with 17 points. She made three triples and went two-for-two from the line. Gerlach had eight points and Garcia Perdomo scored seven.

Freshman Stephanie Nnabuihe (freshman, Newbridge, Ireland) led MCC with five rebounds to go along with five points.

The Plainswomen go to 5-8 – seventh among the eight teams in Region IX South and 9-20 overall.

MCC goes to 7-5, in third place, a half-game ahead of Otero who played first-place Lamar Saturday night. The Lady Indians were 14-14 overall.

MCC will close out the season next weekend with road games Friday night at Otero and Saturday afternoon at Trinidad.

Up-to-date information about MCC women’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