Celina Donyo and Zozefine Sipolina each had 17 points and the Western Nebraska Community College women's basketball team scored 27 first quarter points enroute to a 66-59 win over Otero College Thursday evening at Cougar Palace.

                The win moves the Cougars to 7-2 in the South sub-region and 17-8 overall. Otero drops to 5-3 in the conference and 6-16 overall.

                Sipolina said it was a great win, especially playing as they did in the first quarter.

                "The team played very well together," the sophomore said. "That start set the tone for the game. That is our standard."

                WNCC will have close to a week off as they will have two sub-region contests next week on the road when they travel to Lamar Community College on Wednesday and then Southeast Community College in Lincoln on Saturday.

                WNCC started the contest well, scoring the first four points and holding a 13-6 lead in the opening quarter. WNCC had a 23-12 lead and went on to lead after the opening 10 minutes 27-16.

                WNCC scored the first six points of the second quarter and led 33-16 in the first two minutes. After that, the Cougar scoring went south and Otero outscored the Cougars 8-5 the rest of the way. WNCC led at halftime 38-24.

                Otero outscored the Cougars 15-10 in the third quarter, but the Cougars never did relinquish the lead as WNCC had an answer to every run. WNCC led 48-39 at the end of the quarter after a Sipolina 3-pointer.

                The fourth quarter saw Otero get to within three, 53-50 with five minutes to play. WNCC went on a 7-0 run that was highlighted by a bucket from Donyo and Charisma Johnson and a 3-pointer from Sipolina to make it 60-50 with 3:30 to play.

                Otero answered with a 7-0 run to make it 60-57 with two minutes to play. WNCC sealed the win as Johnson made 2-of-4 free throws with under 45 seconds to play for the win.

                WNCC shot just 35 percent from the field and were 6-of-21 from the 3-point arc. Otero shot 40 percent, but were just 3-of-20 from the 3-point line. The Cougars were 12-of-18 from the free throw line while Otero was just 6-of-7.

                WNCC won the rebound battle 51-37. Veralyn Aviles led the team with 10 rebounds while Sipolina had eight.

Otero                   16 8 15 20 – 59
WNCC                27 11 10 18 – 66
OTERO
Itxasne Fernandez Arguello 18, Brooklyn Kaiser 8, Ariadna Pastor Gusta 8, Candela Roy Ibaibarriaga 8, Kaelani Albert-Neha 7, Dayshanay Bruner 5, Haley Lang 3, Aspen Autry 2.
WNCC
Celina Donyo 17, Zozefine Sipolina 17, Charisma Johnson 10, Juseana-Rae Delatori 8, Veralyn Aviles 7, Aniaya Burton-Hernandez 5, Ella Chesta-Carty 2.