MASON CITY – For the ninth straight season, the NIACC women’s basketball team has landed at least one player on the NJCAA Region XI first-team.
This season the first team selection is freshman Kourtney Manning, a 6-foot-0 forward from Hibbing, Minn.
Manning averaged 15.4 points per game (308 points) and 8.4 rebounds per contest (168). She also collected 51 steals and blocked 21 shots.
Manning was selected as the ICCAC women’s basketball player of the week and the NJCAA Division II national player of the week for the week of Feb. 8-14.
Manning was also a NJCAA Region XI-B all-tournament selection.
Manning scored a career-high 25 points against the Graceland University Junior Varsity and grabbed a career-best 17 rebounds against Ellsworth.
Also, NIACC sophomore Abby Leach was a second-team selection. Leach earned third-team all-region honors as a freshman.
Leach, who is from Forest Park, Minn., averaged 12.0 points per game (144 points) and 4.3 rebounds per game (42) in her sophomore season that was limited to 12 games.
Leach had 25 assists and blocked 21 shots.
Iowa Central’s Isabell West was the region’s player of the year and DMACC’s Grace Flanagan was the region’s newcomer of the year.
The defensive player of the year award went to Iowa Central’s Nevaeh Galloway and the coach of the year was Kirkwood’s Kim Muhl.
