Colby women cruise past MCC 78-51 in Saturday game

The McCook Community College women's basketball team dropped a 78-51 decision to Colby Community College Saturday in the second game of the Cobblestone Hotel & Suites Classic at the Peter and Dolores Graff Events Center.

"Colby is a good team," Pritchett said. "We took a lickin' tonight. We'll get back at it, watch some film and figure out how to get better."

MCC held an 8-4 lead 3:23 into the game but Colby went on a 20-4 run to close out the quarter and led at the half 38-25.

At intermission, Pritchett said the team always writes on the board three things they've done well and three things they need to work on.

"At the end of the game I wrote down three things we have to work on to move forward: Mental toughness, preparedness and consistency," he said.

"We were complacent after last night's win," he said.

After making four of six 3-point shots to start the game Friday, MCC made just one of 10 in the first half Saturday. Pritchett said he was disappointed with the intensity of the pregame shooting Saturday and believes it translated into a poor shooting performance in the game. MCC shot 57.7 percent from the field in the first 20 minutes Friday and just 30 percent on Saturday. From the mental side of the game he thinks his players were worrying too much about officiating calls and non-calls.

"If you don't have consistency, preparedness and mental toughness, this game is going to be hard – life is going to be hard without those three things," he said.

He said after watching Colby Friday night in a 62-56 win over North Platte the Trojans got 12 offensive rebounds. Prior to Saturday's game the plan was to make boxing out was a priority.

"Our guards didn't do a good job of boxing out and didn't do their jobs and we gave up 10 offensive rebounds in that first half," Pritchett said.

Colby finished with 14 offensive rebounds and out-rebounded MCC in the game 44-24. MCC also turned the ball over 22 times.

Sophomore Maite Lara Garcia (Sant Joan Despi, Spain) led MCC with 17 points and was the only player in double-figures. Sophomores Carla Torrubia Cano (Melilla, Spain) and Valentina Monzo (Santiago, Chile) both scored six points along with sophomore transfer Vanessa Jurewicz (Stockholm, Sweden). Cano had five rebounds, Monza three.

MCC shot 30.2 percent from the field and made three of 19 shots from the 3-point line (15.8 percent).

Colby shot 41.2 percent from the field and made two of nine 3-pointers.

Both teams go to 3-2 on the season.

MCC will play road games for the final eight games of the semester starting Friday in Hobbs, N.M. playing Howard College Friday and No. 5 New Mexico Junior College Saturday in the New Mexico Junior College Classic.

"It's not any easier when you're on the road and the teams that we're playing on the road are really good teams," Pritchett said. "So that's where that mental toughness, that consistency and that preparedness – those three things – will determine how we play on the road."

For more photos from tonight's game, please visit the MCC Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/MPCCMcCook