The Barton Community College women's basketball team produced one of their best defensive performances of the season Wednesday night in Goodland, picking up an important 58-49 victory at Northwest Kansas Technical College.
Snapping a two-game skid, the Cougars stay in a third place tie of the Jayhawk West at 10-8 and 14-13 on the season with NW Tech falling to 4-14 in the league and 8-18 overall.
Barton concludes its regular season road swing on Saturday with a 6:00 p.m. tip at 19th ranked Seward County Community College.
Barton got off to a 10-0 start led by Vanessa Oduah's five points and a deep three-pointer from Tiffany Dortland. NW Tech would battle back late in the quarter on a 8-2 stretch to cut it to a four point game before Paige Talbott's 1-of-2 season debut at the free throw line gave Barton a 15-10 edge at the quarter's conclusion.
Richelle Turney's trey opened up play for the second ten minutes with the Mavericks getting the next four points in closing to within four. Oduah put a quick five points on the board, including draining triple capping her twelve first half points, giving Barton their largest lead of eleven at 25-14 with 5:18 left.
Barton would again stretch the gap to eleven early in the third but the Mavericks got hot knocking down four three-pointers in slicing the margin to just 41-38.
The Cougars clamped down on the defense in the final frame, forcing a pair of shot clock violations in holding the Mavericks scoreless for approximately nine minutes going back to the third quarter until a NW Tech inside bucket stopped the drought with 3:10 left. Offensively Barton wasn't exactly a juggernaut, adding just eight points to their advantage led by four points from Hannah Valentine.
NW Tech added a free throw before draining their fifth long range shot of the second half, slicing the gap to five with two minutes left. Barton grabbed the next five points with Kolby Davis dishing out her fifth assist of the second half leading to Turney's transition layup and old fashioned play pushing the lead back out to ten.
The Mavericks didn't go down easily, draining a triple out of a timeout before forcing a turnover and cashing in on the layup making it at 54-49 score. Davis answered on the Cougars' end, sinking a pair of big free throws with twenty-two seconds left as Turney added two more with six ticks on the clock closing out the scoring.
Oduah finished with eighteen points with Turney adding fifteen for the lone Cougars in double-figures. Oduah and Queen Ulabo hauled down eight boards each with Ulabo leading the block party with four rejections. Davis was pivotal for the Cougars, knocking down a perfect three shots from the free throw line towards her eight points, secured seven rebounds, and tying a career high distributing seven assists.