MCC men fall to Knights in region opener

The McCook Community College men’s basketball team dropped an 85-81 decision to North Platte Saturday at home to open region play.

“That’s a good North Platte team. They came in here prepared and ready to guard us,” said MCC Coach Dillon Hargrove. “They shot it in well tonight and have a lot of good players.”

The game was tied 47-47 at halftime as the Knights excelled from the 3-point line making eight 3-pointers (from five different players) in the first half. North Platte took a 68-65 lead with 8:34 left in the game. The Knights went on a 12-0 run with 5:21 to play and took an 80-65 lead.

MCC cut the lead to 80-70 at the 4:11 mark. Freshman Djibril Diawara (Aulnay-sous-Bois, France) hit a 3-pointer to make it an 80-73 score with 3:26 left to play and freshman Alier Alier (Bor, South Sudan) slammed home a dunk to cut the deficit to five with 2:07 remaining in the game. The Indians closed to 81-78 at the 1:39 mark but couldn’t complete the comeback.

“I thought we played better with about five minutes left to play,’ said Hargrove. “Overall, we played okay offensively, still shaking off the rust. Defensively, we have to be a lot better.”

Brady Kennison led the Knights with 26 points, Winston Allen added 17 and Justus Michael scored 16.

Alier led MCC with 22 points and 10 rebounds. Diawara scored 19 and hit five triples. Sophomore Nate Coley, (Little Rock, Ark.) scored 18 points and went five for seven from the free-throw line.

“Alier Alier played really well for us and always plays with a high motor, he always plays hard,” said Hargrove. “Djibril shot it in pretty well in the second half and Nate did what he does – gets to the free-throw line and makes layups.”

North Platte goes to 1-0 in the region and 8-8 overall.

The Indians fall to 0-1 and 10-7 overall. MCC will continue in Region IX play at home again next weekend hosting Otero College (1-12) Friday, Jan. 16 at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday Jan. 17 against Trinidad State (7-8) with a 4 p.m. tipoff time.

“We just didn’t look super cohesive today,” said Hargrove. “A couple of our guys played limited minutes dealing with sickness, but we’re looking to get back on the right page running our offense and defending.”

Up-to-date information about MCC men’s basketball including livestream links for home games, schedule, statistics, rosters, photos and more can be found on the MCC Athletics website, www.mccindians.com