Scoring over sixty points in both halves of Saturday's matinee at Conestoga Arena, the Barton Community College men's basketball team rewrote history in a NBA style 129-101 victory at Garden City Community College.
The fourth straight win keeps the nationally receiving votes Cougars tied atop the Jayhawk West standings at 11-3 improving to 19-4 overall. Garden City's fifth straight loss sinks to 8-15 on the year, sixth in the West at 2-12.
Barton begins their second trip around the West division on Wednesday in hosting Pratt Community College in a 7:30 p.m. tip-off. The third place Beavers (8-6, 14-9) knocked off the then 17th ranked Cougars 91-80 on Pratt's home floor in the team's initial meeting on January 13.
The Cougars' record setting shooting afternoon began with a 71.1% connection rate in first half action to lead 64-60. Barton would miss just four shots in the second half for 85.2% shooting, finishing the game 50-of-65 from the field for a torrid 76.9% to shatter last year squad's top performance of 69.6% November 10.
Outpacing the Broncbusters 65-51 in the final twenty minutes, the teams combined for the third most points in program history.
Connecting on 10-of-16 from behind the arc, the 62.5% long distance shooting matched the 2018 team for third best percentage under twenty attempts. Coming off the bench late in the contest, Koriyon Carr and Korbin Widiger added to the hot shooting, draining a three pointer each helping the Cougars to their second straight and ninth game of the season knocking down ten or more.
Six Cougars finished in double-figures with ten players adding to the scoring column.
Keandre Bowles continued his torrid stretch, coming off a career high thirty-one points Wednesday at Hutchinson to pump in twenty-seven on 11-of-14 shots during the afternoon in averaging over 23 points in the last four games.
Mavrick Gildyard chalked up a career high twenty-three points, going 8-of-11 from the floor and a perfect seven attempts from the charity stripe leading the Cougars' 19-of-21 connections from the free throw line for 90.5% and securing a team high six rebounds helping Barton to a four board edge on the glass.
Desean Munson missed just two of his eleven shots from the field to finish with eighteen while Justin Harmon's lone miss was from one of his three shots behind the arc on the sixteen point day.
Joining Harmon in double-figure scorers off the bench, Martin Vogts buried 3-of-4 behind the arc for fourteen points to go along with four assists as Anthony Atkinson-Enneking nailed all five of his shots from the field for ten points. Diovonte Caldwell knocked down the Cougars' first three-pointer of the day putting Barton out in front for good on an early 9-7 advantage.
Barton's leading scorer on the season Jaheim Holden finished with four points in the final 3:27 but the point guard led the high scoring affair dishing out twelve assists against just one turnover.
The Cougars turned the ball over just five times during the afternoon track meet, the third best ball security in program lore.
Leading 21-19, Barton put the Broncbusters on their heels with a 7-0 run, five coming from Harmon beginning with his first triple of the day with Munson converting Enneking's assist pushing the margin to nine. Garden City's Tahlik Chavez connected on one of his nine made three pointers on the ensuing possession with Harmon knocking down his second triple for the answer.
The eight point margin would be as close as the Broncbusters would be for the final 31:30 of the afternoon.
Chavez' 9-of-12 from beyond the arc with a couple of short range shots finished with a game high thirty-one points. Traylynn Spencer sank 11-of-12 from the stripe on the way to a twenty-six point performance with Michael Frazier completing the double figure Broncbuster scorers with twenty-two off the bench.