The Barton Community College men's basketball team played well enough to win for 30 minutes Saturday night, but were outscored by sixteen points down the stretch as Seward County Community College rallied for a 79-72 win on sophomore night at The Greenhouse.
Like the women, the loss didn't drop the Cougars in the standings as Barton remains alone in second place of the Jayhawk West at 13-6 in dropping to 21-7 on the year while the Saints hold steady in fifth at 9-10 improving to 16-12 overall.
With two games remaining in the regular season, Barton will have home court advantage in the final two key contests. The stretch begins on Wednesday in trying to hold off fourth place Hutchinson Community College on Hall of Fame Night with Saturday's Sophomore Night welcoming in Garden City Community College. Tip off times for both set for 7:30 p.m. at the Barton Gym.
The Cougars led by as much as nine Saturday in the first half, thanks to an 8-2 run and still had an eight point cushion at the intermission following five straight from Diovonte Caldwell including a buzzer beating pull-up deep trifecta.
Maintaining a three-possession lead through the opening six minutes of the second stanza, the Cougars would seize their first double-digit lead following Anthony Atkinson-Enneking's 1-for-2 trip from the charity stripe. Barton would grow the margin to its largest of the game of eleven 61-50 with 11:03 to play following Keandre Bowles' conversion of an old fashion three point play.
The tide would swing as the Saints whittled away at the lead in the final ten minutes taking advantage of eleven costly second half Barton turnovers. Seward County's 16-3 run over nearly a six minute span put the Saints in front with 5:22 to play for the home lead since the 18:07 mark of the opening half. Barton would knot the contest up one final time following a Caldwell jumper before the Saints would take the lead for good 68-66 with 4:47 on the clock.
Barton would cusp within one, 71-70 following Martin Vogts' 3-for-3 trip to the free throw line but the Saints offense would be too much as Ramiro Santiago put the dagger on the Cougars drilling a step-back corner triple with thirty-two seconds remaining helping Seward close the contest on a 8-2 run, outscoring Barton 27-11 over the final 9:18.
Three Cougars reached double-digits as Barton put all eight who saw the floor in the scoring column. Caldwell paced the Cougars with sixteen points converting 3-of-4 from the charity stripe. Bowles and Vogts rounded out the double-figure scoring with twelve a piece. Enneking pulled down a team high six rebounds, while Jaheim Holden dished out a team high honors of three assists.
Seward County was led by Branton McCrary's game high eighteen points and seven assists. Roy Clarke added in seventeen points off the bench while Ramiro Santiago tallied ten on 2-of-3 long distance shooting. Stephen Takyi recorded a game high eight rebounds.