NWC tops North Idaho All-Stars

The Northwest College women’s basketball team split a pair of weekend games in the Big Horn Federal Shootout. The Trappers fell to nationally-ranked Snow College for the second time in as many weeks on Friday, but bounced back to slip past the East Idaho All-Stars on Saturday.

The results leave the Trappers 8-5 on the season as they look to begin Region IX North play this week.

On Friday, the Trappers grabbed a three-point first half lead, but couldn’t match that effort in the second half. Snow shot better than 54 percent after intermission, including a 3-for-5 display from 3-point range as the team pulled away for a 75-64 victory.

“We need to do a better job of taking care of the basketball,” Trapper coach Janis Beal said. “In the first half, we did a good job of taking care of the ball and valuing each possession. In the second half, I didn’t feel we did as good a job in that area.”

Mariah Duran finished with 20 points for Northwest. Layana de Souza added 16 points and Kennedy Allen finished with 13 points. Unfortunately for the Trappers, Snow College limited Northwest’s bench to just eight points in the game.

“We just didn’t get the production there that we needed,” said Beal. “On Saturday, we had some good minutes and production from the bench and that was the difference between the two games.”

Meagan Butler and de Souza also reached double figures for Northwest with 11 points each.

“Both Leslies did a good job coming off the bench and running the floor for us,” said Beal. “They shot the ball well and knocked down some shots when they got looks.”

The Trappers used a late first-half run to open space on the scoreboard and carry a five point lead into the half. Another run early in the second half pushed the lead into double figures and the East Idaho All-Stars were unable to muster a significant run at the Trappers’ advantage as Northwest won by an 89-78 final count.

Northwest travels to Central Wyoming on Wednesday for its next action. The game will be a Region IX North contest as basketball changes from four sub-regions to two divisions this year. Region IX will still hold one regional basketball tournament at year’s end, but teams will only be paired in North and South divisions for regional tournament seeding purposes.

Snow 75, Northwest 64

Meagan Butler 5, Kennedy Allen 13, Layana de Souza 16, Taylor Ryan 2, Mariah Duran 20, Savannah Minder 2, Saige Hartman 4, Leslie Blackburn 2.

Northwest 89

East Idaho All-Stars 78

Meagan Butler 11, Kennedy Allen 2, Layana de Souza 11, Taylor Ryan 6, Mariah Duran 22, Savannah Minder 6, Ekaterina Sharova 2, Saige Hartman 5, Leslie Thronburg 12, Leslie Blackburn 12.