Preview: Columbus Discoverers vs. Lincoln Northeast Rockets
Columbus is 0-7 against Lincoln Northeast since December of 2014 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Friday. The Columbus Discoverers will be home for the holidays to greet the Lincoln Northeast Rockets at 7:00 p.m. Columbus is out to stop a ten-game streak of losses at home dating back to last season.
Columbus pushed their score all the way to 62 on Tuesday, but even that wasn't enough to win. They lost to Kearney at home by a decisive 81-62 margin. Columbus has not had much luck with Kearney recently, as the team's come up short the last seven times they've met.
Defeat or not, Columbus got some senior leadership from Tanner Esch who scored 16 points along with eight assists and Griffin Micek who scored 21 points. Micek scored a full 33.9% of Columbus' points, the third time in a row he's earned more than a third of the team's points. Another player making a difference was Jose Garcia, who scored nine points.
Even though they lost, Columbus were working as a unit and finished the game with 19 assists. That's the most assists they've managed all season.
Meanwhile, Lincoln Northeast pushed their score all the way to 78 on Saturday, but even that wasn't enough to win. They took a 93-78 bruising from Gretna. Despite running the score up even higher than they did last Thursday (70), Lincoln Northeast still had to take the loss.
Lincoln Northeast's loss came about despite a quality game from Mowafag A abdalla, who scored 20 points. That's the first time this season that A abdalla scored 15 or more points. The team also got some help courtesy of Easton Switzer, who scored 12 points.
Columbus' defeat dropped their record down to 1-4. As for Lincoln Northeast, their loss dropped their record down to 2-2.
Keep an eye on the arc in Friday's match: Columbus have made nailing deep shots look easy this year this season, having only averaged 6.2 threes per game. However, it's not like Lincoln Northeast struggles in that department as they've been averaging 10.2 threes per game. Given these competing strengths, it'll be interesting to see how their clash plays out.
Columbus took a serious blow against Lincoln Northeast when the teams last played back in December of 2022, falling 60-33. Will Columbus have more luck at home instead of on the road? Come back here after the game to get analysis of the match and other basketball content.
