STERLING, Colo. – The Western Nebraska Community College men's basketball team started strong and then fell to Northeastern Junior College 72-53 in a South Sub-region contest Saturday in Sterling, Colorado.

                NJC's win gave the Plainsmen the South Sub-region championship and the right to host the men's Region IX tournament March 12-14. The Cougars will be on the road next weekend as they will travel probably to either Northwest or Laramie County for a first-round contest.

                The complete first-round pairings will be released early next week.

                WNCC had an early 3-2 lead after an old-fashioned 3-point play by Toms Linis and pushed it to 5-2 when Linis stole the ball and dunked the ball. WNCC led 18-12 with nine minutes left in the opening half.

                NJC took the lead at 19-18 with 7:24 to play in the opening half on two free throws and pushed the lead to 23-18 with 6:50 to play. Noah Jones stopped the NJC run with a 3-pointer. NJC would go on to lead at halftime 38-27.

                The second half saw the Plainsmen go up by 10, 41-31 with 16:38 to play. WNCC hit a bucket by Viktor Lukic-Gavric with 15 minutes to play. The Cougars then went scoreless for nearly three minutes before a free throw by Isaiah St. Preux and then a 3-pointer by Xavier Kirkpatrick to make it 50-37.

                WNCC made it a 10-point game at 59-48 on a Linis 3-pointer with 7:30 to play. After that, neither team scored for the next two minutes and the Cougars couldn't get any closer as NJC won 72-53.

                WNCC shot 36 percent from the field and made just 4-of-23 shots from beyond the 3-point arc. NJC shot 56 percent and they only made 2-of-12 from the 3-point line.

                WNCC had just one in double figures as Xavier Kirkpatrick tallied 13 points followed by Viktor Lukic-Gavric with nine.

WNCC                27 26 – 53
NJC                   33 39 – 72
WNCC
Xavier Kirkpatrick 13, Viktor Lukic-Gavric 9, Toms Linis 8, Melchi Egbeyemi 8, Amare Jackson 5, Max Orchard 2, Witold Czerenkiewicz 2, Isaiah St. Preux 1.
NJC
Quis Davis 24, Ethan Carter 18, Dodge Davis 15, Parker Davis 6, Ethan Thyne 3, Trevor Thomas 2, Alan Acevedo Dagda 2.