NIC women turned back, but men cruise

Salt Lake Community College is making Christianson Gym a home away from home.

The Bruins, who knocked off No. 1-seeded North Idaho College to win the Region 18 women’s basketball tournament last March on NIC’s home court, turned back a Cardinal rally in the second half to post a 74-62 victory Friday at Christianson Gym.

“We’ve had our share of wins here, at least the last couple years,” Salt Lake coach Betsy Specketer said with a smile. “It feels almost as good as home.”

Meanwhile, the North Idaho College men, in their first game without leading scorer Brian Morris, buried Salt Lake with 15 3-pointers and rolled to a surprisingly easy 93-77 Scenic West Athletic Conference win.

“I’m really proud of them,” NIC coach Jared Phay said. “We had a good week of practice and I feel like we played together and we played really hard.”

The teams square off again tonight – women at 5:30, men at 7:30.

Women: Salt Lake 74, NIC 62

Both teams were missing their top scorers. NIC’s Simone Jordan, averaging 17.6 points, is out with a knee injury and Salt Lake center Breanne Law (10.6 ppg) is sidelined with a shoulder injury.

But points were harder to come by for NIC, which shot just 35.7 percent.

“Simone is so explosive and creates so much,” said NIC coach Chris Carlson, whose team dropped to 14-5, 6-3 in the SWAC. “We struggled offensively. We didn’t have good rhythm out there, but it’ll make us better” in the long run.

Results of an MRI on Jordan’s knee should be known Monday.

Salt Lake (15-4, 7-2) made 60 percent from the floor in the first half to build a 40-28 advantage. Even more important than the Bruins’ shooting accuracy was their rebounding prowess. Salt Lake held a 45-25 rebounding advantage against NIC, which is also playing without center Paige McGowan, who has a broken bone in her hand. McGowan might return next week.

NIC threatened throughout the second half as backup guard Brittany Duerr hit four 3-pointers, two of them trimming the Bruins’ lead to three. Each time, Salt Lake had answers, often with sophomore forward Katie King maneuvering inside.

Men: NIC 93, Salt Lake 77

NIC (12-7, 4-5) was so efficient in the first half that Phay found himself with little to say to his team in the locker room. So, NIC returned to the court with about 7 minutes left for an extended warm-up. Salt Lake, meanwhile, didn’t emerge from its locker room until right before the buzzer sounded.

Scott Stockwell, who poured in a career-high 31 points, hit a 3-pointer on NIC’s first possession and Kerry Williams, Nick Livi and Shawn Henderson quickly joined in with 3s as NIC led 21-11 after 7 minutes.

“We all played as a team,” Stockwell said. “We played hard on defense. We ran like we were in open gym.”

Stockwell opened the second half with a pair of 3-pointers as NIC’s lead swelled to 49-27. Salt Lake (15-4, 6-3) never got closer than 14.

Phay dismissed Morris for academic and attitude reasons earlier in the week.

“I kidded around with Jared before the game that I didn’t know what they would do (without Morris), but I thought they’d spread it more, shoot more 3s and try to beat us off the dribble, which they did,” Salt Lake coach Norm Parrish said.