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Sharpshooting Knights blaze past Indians, 96-89
The North Platte men’s basketball team shot 59.6 percent from the field Tuesday on the way to a 96-89 win over McCook Community College in the Peter and Dolores Graff Events Center.
“We’re a better defensive team than that,” Brandl said. “A team comes in here and shoots 56 percent on your home floor and the last two games you’ve held good offenses to 36 percent. They just went off tonight.”
North Platte’s German Plotnikov led all scorers with 37 points on an 11 of 20 shooting night from the field and made all 15 of his free throw attempts. Dennis Trevon scored 20 for the Knights.
“German is a heck of a player and No. 20 (Trevon) gets 20 on us, that’s well over his average and we can’t do that. We can’t give up those types of stats. We have to be better there and we will,” Brandl said.
The opening minutes of the game proved to be an indicator of the struggles the Indians had in the first half.
“We started the game with two bad turnovers, that’s tough to look at and we just got off to a flat start and we just couldn’t recover and they just played better,” Brandl said. “We can’t turn the ball over like that and we haven’t been turning the ball over.”
The Indians turned the ball over 11 times in the first half and overcame early turnovers to take a five-point lead at the 14:47 mark. But the Knights surged ahead by seven with 8:32 left in the half and went on to lead at the half 41-37.
MCC made some runs in the second half but those were countered by North Platte.
“I thought we had some pretty good looks there late, we just didn’t make them. We have to figure out ways to shoot the ball better again. Teams are trying to take away our 3’s because we’re the 12th best team in the nation in made 3’s so teams are keying on that and we have to get better around the rim.”
After shooting 58.1 percent in the first half, North Platte made 16 of 26 second-half field goals (61.4 percent. The Knights were three of nine from the 3-point line but out-scored MCC at the free throw line 22-9.
MCC was nine of 14 from the foul line (64.3 percent). North Platte made 22 of 28 free throws (78.6 percent).
“We have to figure out ways to get fouls,” Brandl said. “But we have to get stronger around the rim to get those foul calls.”
MCC shot 57.1 percent for the game and made nine of 27 shots from the arc. The Indians were out-rebounded 26-25.
Sophomore Rahkiem Petterson (Midland, Texas) led MCC with 17 points. Redshirt freshman William Lee (Dodge City Community College transfer) scored 16 and sophomore Boaz Quinlan (Beavertown, Oregon) scored 12 points on a three-for-six night from the 3-point line. Freshman Julian Lual (Calgary, Alberta) led MCC with seven rebounds to go along with eight points.
“I thought we played hard but our attention to detail just wasn’t there tonight and that’s on your head coach. Our guys were ready to play effort-wise but if the details aren’t there -- as the coach I have to figure out ways to be better for them and put our guys in better sports,” Brandl said.
The Knights improve to 3-8 and 2-1 in the Nebraska Community College Athletic Conference.
MCC goes to 8-5 overall and 1-2 in NCCAC play. This weekend MCC travels to Columbus and Beatrice for games against Central Community College (Saturday at 6 p.m.) and Southeast Community College (Sunday at 4 p.m.).
“Time to get back to the basics with two conference games this weekend, we have to be ready to play Saturday-Sunday because those teams play so physical,” Brandl said.