WEST PLAINS, Mo. – The Western Nebraska Community College volleyball team double-doubles from Jenna Curtis and Shanelle Martinez and the Cougar teams earned a spot in the fifth-place match on Saturday after sweeping past Central Wyoming College 25-22, 25-16, 25-13 on Friday at the NJCAA national tournament.

                The Cougars earned their spot in the 12:30 p.m. fifth-place game with a workmanlike performance over Region IX foe Central Wyoming as Martinez had 32 set assists and 20 digs while Curtis had a triple-double of 10 kills, 17 digs, and 14 points.

                WNCC will face Salt Lake Community College on the final day of the tournament for fifth. Salt Lake earned a sweep over Trinity Valley Community College 25-20, 25-18, 25-14. Central Wyoming and Trinity Valley will play for seventh place. The ninth-place match will pit New Mexico Military against Utah State Eastern.

                The finals, which will be played at 6:30 p.m. and will be on ESPN+, will have No. 1 Florida Southwestern against No. 6 Miami Dade. Florida Southwestern topped No. 5 Missouri State-West Plains 25-16, 25-20, 26-24, while Miami Dade swept past No. 2 Indian Hills 25-22, 25-21, 25-13. MSU-West Plains will face Indian Hills for third place.

                Friday’s win over Central Wyoming College was much needed after the Cougars hopes for a national title was dashed by the host school Missouri State-West Plains. But, like the players have done all year, they bounced back with authority in getting the win over Central Wyoming.

                Emmalei Mapu, who had five kills and had a hitting percentage of .417, said they had a great showing in the win Friday.

                “Our team played very well and we played united,” the freshman middle hitter from Hawaii, said. “From the bench to the players on the court, everyone just had great energy and was able to pull off a great and fun win over Central.”

                Mapu said they did everything right coming into the contest and that included have plenty of energy.

                “We just made sure we had good energy from warm ups,” she said. “Coming into the game, we told ourselves that we needed to just bounce back and play at our level again and that’s exactly what we were able to do.”

                Now, this team has a chance to play for fifth and become one of just five teams to finish the season with a win heading into next year. Mapu said they are excited to play Salt Lake, a team they lost to early in the season.

                “I think we are all very excited,” she said. “It’s gonna be a great match-up knowing that we’ve played them before and we all have a set game plan that hopefully we can all stick together and execute.”

                The match against Central was the same way as the team was focused and got the job done and like the previous three times they played the Rustlers, the first two sets were battles.

                The first set saw WNCC take a 4-1 lead after three Curtis points, but Central Wyoming came back to grab an 11-10 lead. Curtis hammered a kill and then served four straight points for a 15-11 lead.

                The Rustlers came right back tie things at 15-15 before Alex Hernandez had two service points while Erica Fava had two kills for an 18-15 lead. WNCC led 21-16 before Central knotted things at 21.

                The tie was short-lived as Mapu got a kill and then Ale Meoni finished off the set with a kill and the 25-22 win.

                The second set saw Central jump to a 4-0 lead before the Cougars went up 5-4 on three Curtis service points. Central led 9-8, but that would be the last time the Rustlers would lead as Fava had two points for an 11-8 lead. WNCC led 19-12 after three Curtis points and would cruise to the win as Fava served the final two points for the 25-16 win.

                The third set started close again as Central led 4-2 before Meoni had three points for a 6-4 lead. WNCC pushed the lead to 10-5 on three Fava points. WNCC controlled the set after that as Martinez had two service points for a 16-8 lead and then Meoni had two points for a 22-11 lead. The Cougars won the set 25-13 on a Hernandez kill.

                WNCC finished the match with 43 kills and a .280 hitting percentage. Central Wyoming had just 21 kills and hit .087.

                Curtis had that triple-double, but also had two aces, a solo block, and two assisted blocks, while Martinez had four points with a kill. Meoni led the team with 15 kills while also having seven points and six digs, while Fava tallied nine kills, two set assists, three aces, and 15 digs.

                Also for the Cougars, Hernandez tallied three kills, four points, and three digs; Mapu had five kills, five digs, and three assisted blocks; Keoho had five digs; and Chavez had 11 digs, six set assists and two points.

                Saturday will the final game for the team and Mapu said being at the national tournament is special and they want to make the ending very special for the eight sophomores that will be playing their final game in a Cougar uniform.

                “Being a freshman on the team, I know there is a lot at stake for our sophomores,” Mapu said. “We all just want to go back home with the best possibilities at this point and finish strong because this is ultimately what we’ve worked for all season.”

                Mapu said the national tourney was special for her and she has plenty of memories to remember the trip.

                “I’ve made a lot of fun memories with this team here at nationals, but not only in this last week but throughout the whole season,” she said. “They honestly have become some of my best friends and I am thankful to have the opportunity to play with them this whole season. One memory from nationals though is when our bus broke down and when there was a fire at the school we practiced at on the way to nationals because it just made the journey way more fun knowing the journey we went on coming into the tournament.”

WNCC men play hard against No. 3 Salt Lake before falling

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah – The Western Nebraska Community College men’s basketball team put a scare into the No. 3 ranked Salt Lake Community College on Friday in the SLCC Classic, but in the end, the Bruins put together a couple late runs to earn the 97-80 win.

WNCC drops to 2-3 on the season and will be back in action Saturday in the classic when they take on Taylormade Prep. Taylormade Prep faced Eastern Wyoming College on Friday and lost 107-55. 

The Cougars and Bruins were in a battle in the first half as WNCC trailed 29-21 and then went on an 8-0 run behind back-to-back treys by Maurice Walker. Salt Lake hit a bucket, but WNCC kept pace with Salt Lake with ties at 31, 33, 36, and 38 points.

The Bruins went up 42-38 and that was when WNCC went on a 9-3 run behind four points from Carl Thorpe and a big trey by Walker for a 47-45 lead at halftime.

WNCC kept the heat on to start the second half, leading 59-53. Salt Lake came back to grab a 70-69 lead and went up 76-69. The Cougars cut the deficit to four at 80-76 on a bucket by Daniel Bula.

Salt Lake went up 88-76 and never looked back as Salt Lake went on to win by 17 points.

WNCC shot 47% for the game while SLCC shot 56%. WNCC buried 10 treys compared to just five for the Bruins. Both teams were at the free throw line plenty of times as they combined for 53 attempts. WNCC was 18-of-26 while Salt Lake was 20-of-27.

WNCC was led in scoring by Thorpe with 21 points including going 9-of-10 from the charity stripe.

Rodney Sawyer had 17 points with three 3-pointers, while Biko Johnson tallied 12 points with four assists before fouling out. Walker tallied 10 points with three treys.

   

WNCC        47 33 - 80

SLCC        45 52 - 97

WNCC
Carl Thorpe 21, Rodney Sawyer 17, Biko Johnson 12, Maurice Walker 10, Daniel Bula 9, CJ Johnson 7, Dimitrije Nikolic 2, Stephen Ovia 2.

SCCC

Alejandro Vasquez 21, Hunter Erickson 18, Jalen Weaver 13, Andre Mulibea 10, Jared Garcia 10, Dwayne Koroma 10, Tyson Garff 10, Jaxon Pollard 5.

WNCC women fall to Casper

CASPER, Wyo. – The Western Nebraska Community College women’s basketball team battled, but fell short in the Casper Tip-off Classic Friday to No. 10 Casper College 85-71.

The Cougars drop to 3-2 on the season and will face another ranked team as they will take on No. 15 Salt Lake Community College on Saturday. Salt Lake opened the Classic when they beat Casper College on Thursday  96-92 in overtime and then defeated Northeastern Junior College on Friday 89-50.

WNCC was playing short-handed on the night and still competed against the ranked T-Birds. The Cougar women held a 5-4 lead on a Mackenzie Joseph bucket. Casper then went on a 10-0 run to lead 14-5 and later 19-9 before WNCC came back on an Ola Duda bucket and a Joseph trey to trail 19-14. Casper led after one period 21-14. 

The second quarter saw the Cougars outscore Casper in the first half of the second period as Yara Garca had three points, Joseph had a trey and Shiho Isono had a steal and bucket to bring WNCC to within 25-22.

Casper went back up 29-22 and led 32-23 before WNCC got the last buckets of the half to trail 32-28.

The third quarter started out as Casper nailed a trey and then Garcia had a trey. The T-Birds then went up 42-31 and kept the 10-point margin, leading 59-49 after 30 minutes of play.

WNCC opened the fourth quarter hot as Joseph scored the first five points and then Faith Walker had an old-fashioned 3-point play to cut the lead to 59-55.

Casper rebounded and went up 72-58 and never let the Cougars back to within single digits the rest of the way.

Field goal shooting was the difference as Casper shot 49% from the field and buried 12 3-pointers while WNCC shot 39% and made just seven treys.

Joseph led the Cougars with 21 points including three 3-pointers while Garcia and Duda each had 11 points. Garcia had two treys. 

   

WNCC        14 14 21 22 – 71

Casper        21 21 27 26 – 85

WNCC

Mackenzie Joseph 21, Ola Duda 11, Yara Garcia 11, Faith Walker 9, Jayla Owen 8, Shiho Isono 8, Emmie Persson-Bandh 3.

Casper

Joslin Igo 19, Julia Palomo-Vicente 16, Logann Alvar 16, Irene  Fernandez De Caleya 12, Sandra Frau-Garcia 9, Claudia Garrido 5, Flora Goed 4, Mariona Cos-Morales 2, Celina Arnlund 2.