No. 10 Barton men own second half play to pull away with big win at Cloud County #GoBarton

The No. 10 ranked Barton Community College men's basketball team owned second half play Saturday night in Concordia to pull away with a 72-52 win at Cloud County Community College. The bounce back victory keeps Barton tied atop the Jayhawk standings at 19-4 improving to 23-4 overall while Cloud County drops to 4-19 and 6-20 on the year. Barton's next game comes Wednesday with an 8:00 p.m. tip at Pratt Community College (9-14, 12-15).

With both teams shooting under 28% in first half action, it was the Cougars who finally heated up first, getting another spark off the bench from Akeem White in rattling off the final nine points of the half to surge ahead 28-23 to the locker room.

The Cougars came out sizzling to begin second half play scoring the first nine points while holding Cloud County scoreless for nearly seven minutes stretching across the halftime break. The 18-0 stretch ended at the 18:22 mark as Barton's lead had ballooned to 37-23.

The T-birds chipped away at the lead cutting the deficit to four at the second half media timeout but the Cougars responded with an 8-1 stretch to increase the margin back to eleven. From there the Cougars held Cloud County to just one four point stretch while blowing the game open with a 19-3 five minute span to cruise to the victory.

Noah Webster scored all of his team high fifteen points in the second half, knocking down consecutive three-pointers early in second half play and sinking 7-of-8 free throws in the final three minutes of action. Elijah Ford also had a big second half scoring eleven of his thirteen points while White's ten points all came in the first half. Kawanise Wilkins just missed a double-double with nine points and collecting thirteen rebounds to lead a whopping seventeen rebound edge for the Cougars.

Alvin Thompson was the lone T-bird in double figures finishing with twelve while Ramion Burt, Jr. led the squad with nine rebounds.