11/23/14 • By The Telegram Staff

NORFOLK -- The Raiders dropped two games to tough competition over the weekend.

The Central Community College women's basketball team lost to National Junior College Athletic Association Division II, No. 3 Kirkwood Community College 80-75 on Friday, then fell to Northeastern Junior College 79-75 Saturday at the Northeast Nebraska Tournament in Norfolk.

"This is probably the toughest weekend of competition we've played so far," Central head coach Mike Kroupa said. "We played well at times. The first game, we definitely shot a lot better than the second game. Against Northeastern, we couldn't hit shots. Kirkwood had some size on us, and in both games, we got into some foul trouble and that held us back as a team.

"It's never good to lose, but we played two of our hardest opponents right away," he added. "In the first 15 games, we really upped the schedule. We wanted to make it more difficult. I hope playing these highly ranked teams will help us in the future."

The Raiders opened the tournament with a strong first half against third-ranked Kirkwood. Central led 38-37 at halftime.

But Kirkwood was able to gain the advantage in the second half, and outscored the Raiders 43-37 in the second half to secure the five-point win.

"It was tough because we played pretty good defense and we played good offense," Kroupa said. "There was a couple girls on their team that hit some shots that they normally wouldn't. Sometimes, they'd hit shots that we played really good defense against. That's just the luck sometimes."

Adrianna Beck scored a team-high 24 points against Kirkwood. Beck hit six 3-pointers in the game.

"She came out on fire, especially in the first half," Kroupa said. "She scored 16 in the first half. She's continuing to shoot the ball well this year."

Montrese Weller scored 13 points, while Lana'e Washington-Carson added 12 points, and Paige Muhammad and McKenna Rossmeier each chipped in 10 points.

On Saturday, the Raiders fell into an early hole against Northeastern and trailed 38-33 at halftime.

Central outscored Northeastern 42-41 in the second half, but it wasn't enough for the comeback.

"We gave up way too many points in transition against Northeastern and that killed us," Kroupa said. "We just didn't have a very good first half. We fought back, we crawled back into it, but we dug ourselves in too big of a hole against a good team. That was our worst shooting night of the year. Normally, we're more efficient than that."

Montrese Weller led the Raiders in scoring with 19 points.

"She played really good -- probably her best game of the year," Kroupa said of Weller. "She played good on defense and took the ball to the hoop efficiently."

Muhammad scored 11 points against Northeastern, while Washington-Carson and Shananthia Bryant both scored 10 points, and LaShonda Brewer added nine points.

Central travels to Butler Community College Thursday.

Friday at Northeast CC

Game 1

Central (5-4) 38 37 - 75

Kirkwood 37 43 - 80

* CENTRAL - Adrianna Beck 24, Paige Muhammad 10, McKenna Rossmeier 10, Montrese Weller 13, Lana'e Washington-Carson 12, LaShonda Brewer 6.

* 3-point field goals - Central 11 (Beck 6, Weller 3, Muhammad 2).

Saturday at Northeast CC

Game 2

Northeastern 38 41 - 79

Central 33 42 - 75

* CENTRAL - Beck 7, Muhammad 11, Washington-Carson 10, Rossmeier 4, Weller 19, Kelsey Flaherty 1, Paige Higginbotham 4, Shananthia Bryant 10, Brewer 9.

* 3-point field goals - Central 2 (Weller 1, Muhammad 1).