The Barton Community College men's basketball team found out Monday night there are no games off in the Jayhawk Conference as the 17th ranked Cougars had their six game win streak snapped in a 91-80 loss at Pratt Community College.
The loss drops Barton to 6-2 in conference play and 14-3 on the season as its four game victory streak at the Dennis Lesh Sports Arena and seventh in the series comes to an end. Pratt's second straight win improves the Beavers to 4-4 in the Jayhawk and 10-7 overall.
Following its brief two game road stretch, Barton returns home for its next contest in hosting Dodge City Community College on Wednesday in a 7:30 p.m. at the Barton Gym.
Statistically Barton's woes boiled down to field goals as the region's top shooting squad made just twenty-four shots for 35.3%, both season low marks, while Pratt shot over 60% in the final twenty minutes to finish at an even 50%.
Digging themselves an eight point deficit just 1:35 into the contest, a wholesale substitution resulted in the Barton bench providing some spark. Jarin Koehler connected on the first of just four Cougar treys on the evening followed by a Mavrick Gildyard flush and four straight from Keandre Bowles pumped the Cougars to their largest lead of the night 17-15 coming at the 12:28 mark.
The Cougars would match the margin at 22-20 following a Gildyard bucket but an 11-1 Pratt stretch keyed by a personal 7-0 run by Jamel Horton on a pair of trifectas put the Beavers in the driver's seat with 5:25 left in the opening stanza.
The margin grew to twelve with just under four minutes remaining until Martin Vogts ended a 6:08 field goal drought trimming the Beaver lead to single digits. Barton looked to gain momentum closing the first half with a 6-0 run, which could have cut the deficit by another deuce but a sign of the impending offensive struggles showed in the final ticks as a missed buzzer beating layup fell short leaving the Cougars trailing 40-34 to the locker room.
Trading a pair of free throws to open up the second frame, Barton managed to trim the deficit to four following a Jaheim Holden layup but again the Beavers answered taking 7-of-the-next-8 to push the lead back to double-digits at 53-43.
The margin hovered around double digits for the next six minutes until Pratt's Carlos Montiel made a jumper growing the Beavers lead to its' largest of fifteen 67-52 with 8:54 to play.
Barton made one final push cutting it back to seven with 1:23 remaining on the clock but Pratt converted on 8-of-12 from the free throw line down the stretch holding off any chances of a Cougar rally.
All ten Cougars who played added scoring to the Cougars' total with just four reaching double-figures led by the eighteen produced by Holden. Bowles provided a spark off the bench with fifteen while Justin Harmon added fourteen and Gildyard providing ten off the bench. Demarcus Morris, Bowles, and Harmon shared team high rebound honors with six each while Diovonte Caldwell's four assist coming off the bench led the distribution and tied Vogts for a team high three steals.
Horton led all scorers, pumping in a career high thirty-three points off the Pratt bench in knocking down 3-of-4 from long distance and 12-of-16 from the free throw line. Deontae Davis also buried a trio of treys on the night to score fourteen as the Beavers also received some additional big nights off the bench from Harrison Eghan and Drew Honas for sixteen and ten respectively to lead a twenty-nine point advantage from the non-starters.