CHEYENNE, Wyo. -- Western Nebraska Community College's Eduardo Oliveira scored two goals and the WNCC men's soccer team knocked off No. 17 Laramie County Community College 3-1 on Saturday in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
The win moves the Cougars to 7-3-2 on the year, but more importantly, it vaulted the Cougars to the top spot in the Region IX standings. With two matches left, the Cougars have 19 points and are secured in either the first or second seed for the regional playoffs.
The Cougars, because of the one or two seed, will host a semifinal match on October 26. The higher seed will then host the finals November 2.
WNCC has 19 conference points (three points for a win and one point for a tie) and the top six teams make the playoffs. With two matches left, the only team that can pass WNCC for first is LCCC and that is if the Cougars fall in their final matches of the year this weekend.
WNCC will wrap up the regular season on Friday at Northwest College and then Central Wyoming on Saturday. Northwest has nine points while Central Wyoming has 11 points.
Saturday's contest against LCCC saw the Cougars take control of the game early as Alvaro Abeal took a pass from Oliveira to go up 1-0 just 15 minutes into the game.
Shortly later, Oliveria scored in the 29th minute when he took a pass from Anthony Lemus and that is where the score stood at halftime 2-0.
LCCC sliced the score in half as they scored 10 minutes into the half on a goal from Alvin Udoto.
WNCC quickly got the lead back to two goals as Oliveira scored his second goal of the match when he took a pass from Lemus and finished into the back of the net.
Owen Henderson made five saves in net for the Cougars. LCCC had 10 shots in the contest while WNCC had six. The Golden Eagles had seven corner kicks while WNCC had three.