Lady Cougars dominate second half for 74-60 victory
Facing an early ten-point second half deficit, the Lady Cougars exploded for forty-eight points in the last eighteen minutes to defeat the junior varsity squad from Tabor College 74-60 Monday night in Hillsboro, KS. Barton improves to 8-2 on the season and will play again Tuesday evening against the McPherson College Junior Varsity in a 5:30 p.m. tip at the Barton Gym. It will be the last game played on the historic gym floor as Barton will be replacing the surface in time for the Lady Cougars’ home conference opener on January 7.
Barton owned an early five point lead but it was the last lead for the Lady Cougars as Tabor won the last sixteen minutes 26-15. Despite outshooting the Blue Jays 33% to 19%, Barton was slow on the defensive end and sent Tabor to the free-throw line twenty times with the Blue Jays accumulating eighteen points from the charity stripe. Additionally Tabor collected twelve first half offensive rebounds resulting in fourteen points and forced Barton into thirteen turnovers.
The Lady Cougars finally started to get rolling in the second half after trailing by ten at the 18:24 mark, the second time Barton trailed by double-digits in the game. A 5-0 run cut the lead in half but Tabor answered with five points from Mallory Zuercher to lead 41-32 with 16:31 to play.
Back-to-back three pointers by Blair Bloomfield and Payton Scheer followed by an Erin Copeland steal resulting in a Kelsey Keith layup drew the Lady Cougars to within one with 14:18 remaining. Scoreless for the next two minutes, Barton took the lead when Ashton Bruner hauled down a Zuercher missed shot and went coast-to-coast for the layup.
The teams traded leads for the next three minutes until Tabor stretched the lead to five with 8:21 to play. Copeland, who scored twelve of her career high fifteen points in the second half, started the Barton late dominance with a 5-0 run as she knocked down a three-pointer then followed with a layup as Ta'Kerra Williams found her cutting through the lane. Tabor was able to tie it back up at 55 with 6:20 to play but back-to-back treys by Copeland and Bloomfield highlighted Barton closing with a 19-5 run to win the road non-conference contest.