WNCC men fall to Northwest
POWELL, Wyo. – The Western Nebraska Community College men’s soccer team experienced the bad and good on Friday in Region IX conference action.
WNCC was shutout by Northwest College 2-0 on Friday for the bad news. Now, for the good news, Laramie County Community College and Central Wyoming College finished in a 1-1 tie, which gives WNCC the Region IX conference championship and the No. 1 seed in the playoffs.
WNCC goes to 6-1-1 in conference play and 7-4-2 overall. LCCC drops to 5-2-1 in conference and 8-3-1 overall. Both teams have one conference left as WNCC will travel to face Central Wyoming on Saturday while LCCC has Northwest. If LCCC wins and WNCC falls, the two teams will be tied and WNCC holds the tie-breaker as they won the head-to-head meeting last Saturday. If Casper also wins Saturday, they could tie WNCC, but the Cougars hold the tiebreaker on the T-Birds.
Friday’s contest was one where both teams didn’t have a lot of shots. Northwest finished with nine shots while WNCC managed six shots.
The difference in the game was the Trappers scored two goals in a three-minute period in the first half and that was enough for Northwest to get the win.
Northwest scored with 32:45 to play in the opening half when Alan De Paula scored on a Djordy Lefevere assist. Two minutes later, Shota Akima scored on a Shay Lonegran assist.
WNCC’s six shots came from different players. Those getting shots included Isrrael Rodriguez, Lucas Ovalle, Eduardo Oliveira, Anthony Lemus, Guilherme Lindolfo, and Joao Menezes.
Owen Henderson, the freshman goalkeeper from Greeley, Colorado, had five saves in net for the Cougars.
WNCC women fall 4-0 to Northwest
POWELL, Wyo. – The Western Nebraska Community College women’s soccer team played with a lot of determination and had the third-place team in the conference on the ropes for three-fourths of the contest.
The final 20 minutes wasthe difference as Northwest scored four goals to claim the 4-0 win.
The loss drops the Cougars to 3-5-1 in conference play with one match left to play when they travel to Central Wyoming College on Saturday. The Cougars are in seventh place in the conference standings with the top six teams making the playoffs. A win on Saturday and an Otero loss, would tie the Cougars with Otero for sixth, but Otero holds the tiebreaker on the Cougars with the head-to-head win.
The first half and much of the second half saw the Cougars’ defense play lights out as they thwarted a number of shots from Northwest. Northwest had 34 shots in the contest with 20 on goal while WNCC managed just four shots.
Both teams entered intermission tied at 0-0. Northwest finally scored in the 67th minute on a Ellisen Lewis goal. Two minutes later, the Trappers scored again on a Nayelli Aguayo goal.
The score stayed that way until late when Olivia Bradley scored with 3:15 to play. Forty-five seconds later, Sara De Wit scored to make it 4-0.
Yasmin Urbina had two of the four Cougar shots. The other two came from Tanner Nelson and Audrey Gosvener.
WNCC men’s soccer tops Central Wyoming, earn conference title
RIVERTON, Wyo. – The Western Nebraska Community College men’s soccer team took care of business and with their 3-2 win over Central Wyoming College Saturday afternoon in Riverton, Wyoming, the Cougars claimed the conference championship outright.
With the win, the Cougars earned the No. 1 seed in the Region IX playoffs that begin next week with first-round matches. WNCC and Casper College, the No. 1 and 2 seeds earned first-round byes and will host the semifinals on October 26. The finals are slated for November 2 and WNCC could host as well.
The win moves the Cougars to 8-4-2 on the season and 7-1-1 in conference play. Casper is second in the conference with a 6-2-1 record. The next four teams in the conference will play in the first round as Northwest and Otero will host either Laramie County Community College or Central Wyoming College.
Saturday’s regular season final was a battle to the final minute. The two teams settled for a 1-1 tie at halftime. WNCC scored first as Isrrael Rodriquez fed Eduardo Oliveira with a pass and the Cougar’s leading goal scorer stuck it into the back of the net in the 15th minutes.
Five minutes later, Central Wyoming’s Tanner Johnson hit a penalty kick to knot things up.
Five minutes into the second half, Yediel Hernandez scored an unassisted goal to put the Cougars up 2-1. It didn’t last long as Central Wyoming tied it at 2-2 on a Samir Siqueira goal.
WNCC got the winning goal in the 76th minute when Oliveira picked up an assist after giving Lucas Ovalle a nice ball and the sophomore nailed the ball in the back of the net.
Both teams had nine shots in the contest.
WNCC’s Owen Henderson had four saves in net.
WNCC women fall to Central Wyoming
RIVERTON, Wyo. – The Western Nebraska Community College women’s soccer team saw their season come to an end after falling 2-1 to Central Wyoming College in Riverton, Wyoming.
WNCC finished eighth with 10 points in the conference standings and the top six teams make the post-season tourney. The Cougars finished the season at 3-11-1 and were 3-6-1 in conference play.
The six teams that made the playoffs included Casper and Western Wyoming will get the byes as the top two teams. The other four teams — Northwest, Laramie County, Gillette, and Otero — will play next weekend in first-round games.
The WNCC and Central Wyoming contest was competitive and the excitement started early as Cougar goalkeeper Emily Villagomez, who had 34 saves in net for the game, made diving save on a penalty kick in the first 10 minutes of the contest.
All the scoring happened in the first half. Central Wyoming bolted to a 2-0 lead as Kristen Moss scored in the 13th minute and then Rakiya King scored in the 21st minute.
WNCC cut the deficit in half when Yasmin Urbina scored off a free kick in the 29th minute and that is where the teams stood at halftime.
The second half saw no scoring.
Central Wyoming had 42 shots in the contest while WNCC managed just three. Mariah Russel had two and Urbina had the other goal.
The Cougars will saw goodbye to nine sophomores from this season including Emily Villagomez, Lizbeth Barrera, Jade Brothwell, Valentina Mejia-Cuaeva, Alejandra Rodriguez, Ashley Villagomes, Stephanie Villagomez, Yasmin Urbina, and Ariel Veliz.
The Cougars have a good group of freshmen that will return that saw plenty of action.
