The Western Nebraska Community College men's basketball team put six players in double figures in running by McCook Community College 116-61 Saturday evening at Cougar Palace in the first round of the Region IX tournament.

                The moves the Cougars to 23-7 on the season, but more importantly advances the Cougars in to the quarterfinals of the Region IX tournament next week. WNCC will face Central Wyoming or defeated Northwest College 78-75 Saturday. WNCC will play at 1 p.m. on Thursday in LaJunta, Colorado.

                Saturday's win was the last game at home for the Cougars as the South No. 1 seed Otero Junior College locked in the host of the tournament with an 83-72 win over Northeastern Junior College. Otero trailed 38-37 at the half.

                Saturday's win was a complete game for the Cougars on both sides. Vinny Shahid, who had 17 points in the win, said the team played great.

                "We were just more aggressive today and more aggressive than usual," Shahid said. "When we are aggressive, we just beat up other teams and then the defense leads into offense. I think we played pretty good, but the thing I think we did better was defense."

                Aggressive the Cougars were, too. WNCC jumped out to a 12-3 lead only to watch McCook come back to cut the deficit to 12-11 on back-to-back 3-pointers by D'Von Moore. After that, the Cougars went on a 17-0 run behind 3-pointers by Trent Harris and Marko Rajanovic. WNCC kept playing strong the rest of the half, grabbing a 58-34 lead at halftime.

                WNCC kept that defensive intensity up in the second half as well, outscoring McCook 58-27 and they did it with a variety of players, too, with 10 different players finding the scoring column. WNCC went up by 40 over McCook 81-41 on a Jervay Green bucket with 13:43 to play.

                Harris later followed with three 3-pointers to give the Cougars a 95-49 lead. WNCC hit the century mark as Austin Hoffman picked the ball and went in for a lay-up with 8:11 to play. Hoffman finished the game with 10 points in the final 10 minutes. Milos Popovic also had two big buckets in the final minutes and Bryce Sanchious had a big trey and dunk in the win.

                Shahid said this team thrives on finding the open person with so many offensive weapons on the court.

                "We thrive on contagious scoring," he said. "We all know what each other's scoring areas are and when we find each other in the scoring areas, we expect each other to knock it down with confidence."

                Harris led all scorers with 23 points, including six 3-pointers. Green finished with 20 points, including a monster dunk in the second half.

                Also netting double digits were Shahid with 17, Djordje Dimitrijevic with 13, Martin Roub wth 14, and Hoffman with 10.

                WNCC shot 66 percent from the field compared to just 40 percent for McCook. The Cougars sank 19 3-pointers in the game. Besides Harris' six treys, Green had three, while Hoffman, Roub, Dimitrijevic, and Shahid each had two.

                Now the Cougars will head to the 3-day regional tournament in LaJunta, Colorado that begins Thursday. Shahid said they just have to stay together and keep playing aggressive defense.

                "We just have to get back in the gym and work hard and just keep getting better on the defensive end because the offense will take care of itself," he said. "This was a good win to get. We are 1-0 in the post season and now we are back to 0-0. It is just one loss and you go home so we will try to go 1-0 again."

                Other first-round scores in the Region IX tournament played Saturday saw Gillette top Miles 106-73, Otero beat NJC 83-72, Central Wyoming topping Northwest Wyoming 78-75, Trinidad topping North Platte 72-68 in two overtimes, Casper beating Western Wyoming 91-84, Lamar winning over LCCC 76-74, and Sheridan topping Little Big Horn 109-73.

McCook               34 27 – 61

WNCC                   58 58 – 116

MCCOOK

D'Von Moore 10, Kairee Forte 4, Andy White 7, Peanut Cunningham 13, Toni Kumanovic 3, Kaiania Williams 6, Shevelle Bailey 2, Isaiah Richardson 1, Antonije Petrovic 3, Alassane Seck 2, Chuol Biel 4, Chinedu Okonkwo 6.

WNCC

Milos Popivic 4, Trent Harris 23, Bryce Sanchious 5, Vinnie Shahid 17, Marko Rajanovic 8, Austin Hoffman 10, Jervay Green 20, Djordje Dimitrevic 13, Zane Bender 2. Martin Roub 14.