MCC faces Trinidad to open Region IX Tournament

For only the second time in school history, McCook Community College is set to host the four-team Region IX post-season tournament this weekend at the Jaycees Sports Complex.

The Lady Indians will start play Friday hosting Trinidad State at 2 p.m. In the other first-round matchup, Otero College will play Western Nebraska, following the MCC-Trinidad game at approximately 4:30 p.m. This is a double-elimination tournament.

“It’s very exciting for us to host this year,” said MCC third-year coach Mike Mendenhall. “These are all of my recruits and they have bought in to the expectations we set early in the year.”

MCC earned the right to host the tournament by virtue of a record-setting season and winning the regular season championship with a 45-9 record and a 20-4 record in Region IX. The Lady Indians are the top seed, Otero College is the second seed, Western Nebraska is the third seed and Trinidad State the fourth seed. Only the top four teams play in the post-season tournament. Those not qualifying this year were Northeastern Junior College, Luna Community College (New Mexico) and Lamar Community College.

“We knew we were going to be good, but didn’t know how good,” said Mendenhall, who picked up his 100^th career coaching win in a 4-0 win at Lamar on April 13. The Lady Indians went 31-28 in his first season and 34-21 last year.

On Saturday the loser of Friday’s MCC-Trinidad game will play the loser of the Otero-WNCC matchup in an elimination game at noon. The winner of the MCC-Trinidad game faces the Otero-WNCC winner at 2:30 p.m. The final game Saturday will be an elimination game between the winner of Saturday’s first game and the loser of the second game.

On Sunday the championship game is set for noon with a second game to be played at 2:30 if neither team has two losses.

With one more win MCC can set the record for total wins in a season. The 2015 team went 42-14 in the regular season and added three more wins in the post-season where they went 3-3.

This year’s Lady Indians can set the season wins record with one more win, but Mendenhall said he and assistant Rachel Conroy, and the team have more expectations for this season. Conroy has been a part of several coaching staffs since her time as a player from 2012-2014 including as an assistant during that 45-win season in 2015.

“We have achieved multiple goals already this season, with hosting the region tournament, most regular season wins, and many have achieved their individual goals,” Mendenhall said. “But we are not done yet. Our main goal all season long is to win the Region 9 tournament, and we are in a great position to do that.”

The winner of this weekend’s tournament champion advances to the NJCAA Division 1 College World Series May 19-24 at the Pacific Avenue Athletic Complex in Yuma, Ariz.

MCC will livestream all games through the “Watch Live” link on the official website of McCook Community College Athletics at www.mccindians.com

Friday’s game will also be broadcast locally on KZMC True Country 102.1 FM with Seth Baumert on the call. If MCC is involved in Sunday’s game or games, they would also be broadcast on 102-1 True Country.

THE REGION IX TOURNAMENT TEAMS:

McCook (45-9, 20-4 in Region IX): The Lady Indians claimed their second Region IX regular season title which included four-game sweeps over Northeastern Junior College, Luna and Lamar. After losing a pair of games against Otero at La Junta, Colo. on April 6 by the scores of 7-3 and 6-4, MCC came back the next day to win 20-3 and 20-5. In a home series April 18-19, MCC swept Trinidad in four games outscoring the Trojans 31-2. In the final series of the season against Western Nebraska MCC split a pair of games at home April 25, losing 12-6 and winning 9-1. In Scottsbluff on April 27, MCC lost 7-6 and won 7-4. The Lady Indians went 20-2 this season at home. The team is fifth in the nation in total runs (520), eighth in total bases (941) and third in stolen bases (205). MCC pitchers have struck out 323 hitters, seventh best in the nation.

Otero College (18-6, 24-17): The No. 2 seeded Rattlers opened the Region IX season taking three of four games at Luna, swept Lamar and Western Nebraska 4-0, before splitting with MCC at home, winning three of four against Trinidad at home and finishing the regular season April 17 with a 3-1 series win at NJC. Last year Otero and MCC met when the format was a four-team, best-of-three series in the first round. After losing the first game 8-4, the Ratters came back to eliminate MCC 16-15 and 12-3.

Western Nebraska (16-8, 25-23): After winning a doubleheader over Lamar at home to start the Region IX slate, the Cougars lost three of four games at Trinidad March 22-23 then lost three games against Otero March 27-28. That’s when the season turned around for the team from Scottsbluff. They beat Otero 8-7 on March 28 to start a 14-game win streak that propelled them into a third-place finish winning two games at home with Lamar, four games against NJC, four at Luna and splitting the final series with McCook winning the first game of doubleheaders April 25 and 27 and losing the second games.

Trinidad State (11-13, 20-26): The Trojans clinched the fourth final post-season spot Saturday with a 12-3 win over NJC. The team opened Region IX play taking three of four at home against Western Nebraska, splitting four games with Luna and winning two at home over Lamar. Against Otero, the Trojan won 2-0 and lost 10-6 on the road and lost 9-1, 13-0 at home. TSJC lost four games at McCook and split its final four games against Northeastern JC.

BY THE NUMBERS: MCC leads Region IX in scoring by a wide margin averaging 9.6 runs per game – 520 runs scored for the season. Western Nebraska is second with 328 runs (6.8 per game), Trinidad third at 289 and Otero fourth with 267 runs. The Lady Indians lead Region IX in batting average (.389), home runs (62) and stolen bases (205). Trinidad State is second in homers with 39, Otero third with 24 and Western Nebraska has a league-low 14 home runs. The Cougars have 85 stolen bases, second in the region and Otero 71, which is fourth. Trinidad was only credited with one stolen base on the season.

On the pitching side, MCC has allowed the fewest runs 178 and has the best ERA at 2.56. Western Nebraska has allowed 262 runs and has a 4.07 ERA, Otero is fourth among the seven teams with a 5.73 ERA and Trinidad State fifth at 5.90. Lady Indians pitchers have struck out 323 hitters, most in the league but Otero averages a league-best 8.04 strikeouts per game.

LEAGUE LEADERS BATTING: MCC has the top three hitters in the league led by Lexi Knapp at .442, Paige Warren .441, and Kaliyah St. Amand.

The Lady Indians have the top five leaders in RBIs in Region IX. Payton Kinsley leads the league with 73 RBIs, Anna Elliott is second with 62, Paige Warren third with 53, Lexi Knapp is fourth with 45 and Laila Gutierrez fifth with 45.

Kinsley also leads the league with 20 home runs (seventh in the nation), Elliott is second with 14 and Gutierrez is tied for fourth place with eight home runs.

Gutierrez leads all players with 72 stolen bases, which is third most in the country. Warren is second in Region IX with 45 and Elliott fourth with 18.

Trinidad’s Teren Sanchez of Trinidad is fourth in batting average with a .419 mark. Otero’s Sienna Estrada is fifth in batting at.411.

LEAGUE LEADERS PITCHING: St. Amand leads the league with a 2.32 and tied for the league lead with 16 and second in strikeouts with 132. Sadie Kahl is second in ERA at 2.90, fifth in wins with 11.

Otero’s Destiny Martinez leads the league with 160 strikeouts. Keira Gray has a 3.80 ERA, fourth in Region IX, is tied for third in pitching wins with 12 and fourth in strikeouts.

Western Nebraska’s Kayli Kooper is third in ERA at 3.29, tied for the league lead with 16 wins and fifth in strikeouts with 101.

Trinidad’s Kelsey Grant is fifth with her 3.98 ERA, tied for third with 12 wins and third in strikeouts with 107.

HOSTING REGION IX: The only MCC team that has won the regular season Region IX championship was the 2022 team under Coach Kevin Kahlberg. That team finished the regular season at 42-21 with a 21-9 mark in the region. At the post-season tournament held at the Jaycees Sports Complex, the 2022 Lady Indians won the opening game over Northeastern Junior College 5-1, beat Trinidad State 6-4 in the second game and downed NJC 6-4 to win the tournament title. That team then went on to host the Plains District Championship series against Butler Community College. The Grizzlies swept MCC 13-0 and 5-2.