Barton splits games at Garden; still among group near top of West
The Barton County Community College baseball team split a pair of games Wednesday afternoon in Garden City. Barton won the opening contest 9-5 then fell in extra innings to Garden City, missing out on the sweep, 4-3 in the nightcap in 8 innings. The split keeps Barton amongst the league leaders in the loss column with a 6-4 West mark. Every team in the West has at least 4 conferences losses on the season. Hutchinson, Seward County and Colby are all 8-4. Barton is 15-13 overall this season. Garden City goes to 6-6 and 21-10 with the split. In the jumbled standings of the West, 8 of the 9 teams have 4, 5 or 6 losses.

Highlights
Barton fell behind 4-0 in the opening game as Garden City plated 4 runs in the bottom of the 2nd off Barton starter Chad Lee. Lee, a closer to start the season who has been moved into the starting rotation, gave up a 3-run homer in the inning as the Cougars fell behind. But the Broncbuster lead didn't last long. Barton came right back and put up a 4-spot in the top of the 3rd to even the contest and the Cougars never trailed again.

Brent Biggs and Ty Stivers each delivered 2-run singles in the inning as Barton collected 5 hits in the inning. Biggs drove in Tim Ruble and Anthony Dreiling with no outs while Stivers single scored Biggs and Austin Holt to tie the game with 2 outs. The Cougars took their 1st lead of the game in the 4th as Ruble scored again, this time on a Holt single. After Garden evened the contest at 5-all in the bottom of the 5th, the Cougars batters gave their pitching staff some breathing room with a 3-run 6th inning. David Wilson delivered the big blow, belting a 3-run homer to score Ruble for a 3rd time and Biggs for a 2nd time. The Cougars added a run in the 7th on a Wade Gubbels homer as Lee picked up the win to move to 3-1 for the season. Biggs was 3-for-3 in the game with 2 RBI and 2 runs scored. Ruble was 2-for-3 and scored 3 times while Wilson drove in 3 with his homer.

Barton grabbed a quick 2-0 in the 2nd game with single runs in the 1st and 2nd innings. Tyler Rzepka scored Holt with a single in the 1st then Biggs doubled in Gubbels in the 2nd for the 2-0 lead. Another Broncbuster 3-run homer in the 4th gave Garden City a short-lived 3-2 lead before the Cougars evened the game at 3-all in the top of the 5th. Barton tied the game when Eric Whinery singled in Wilson.

The game stayed tied at 3-all into extra innings before Garden scored in the bottom of the 8th to keep the Cougars from gaining the sweep and taking over 1st place alone in the West. Stivers and Rzepka each had 2 hits for Barton in the game. Biggs ended the day with 3 RBI to move him within 1 of the team lead with 18. Currently, Whinery and Holt lead the club with 19 RBI. Wilson (17) and Gubbels (15) each have at least 15 RBI as well. Gubbels homer, his 3rd, gave him the team lead as well.

Stats
Complete stats can be found at www.bartonccc.edu

Next
Sun., April 2 – v Cloud County, 1 pm (West doubleheader at Lawson Field)