Barton drops West opener to streaking Beavers

Barton drops West opener to streaking Beavers
The Barton County Community College women's basketball team knew it would have its hands full Thursday night in the Jayhawk West opener against Pratt, who came into the contest riding an 11-game winning streak and a 13-1 mark. They were right. The Cougars and Beavers battled back and forth during the contest before Pratt finally made the plays late to grab a 74-69 win to start West action. Barton is now 10-5 overall and 0-1 in the West while Pratt is 14-1 and 1-0. Barton will travel to Garden City Saturday for the 1st road West action of the season.

Highlights
The see-saw battle saw the game tied 6 times with 12 lead changes. Pratt's biggest lead of the game was at 8 points while Barton's biggest lead was 5 points. The Cougars led most of the opening stages of the game before Pratt went on a 15-3 run to take a 35-27 lead with just less than 5 minutes to play in the opening half. The Cougars rallied to pull with 2 at 42-40 heading into halftime with a 13-7 run of their own.

Pratt led for most of the 2nd half of action, not surrendering the lead until the 9:21 mark when Barton tied the game at 59-all on a Brittany Ridley layup. Barton continued on its 7-0 run, concluding with a jumper by Ridley to give Barton a 61-59 lead with 8:26 left. The Cougars pushed that lead to 67-62 with 4:47 to play on a 3-pointer by Sharece Love. Pratt, though, answered with a 5-0 run over the next 2 minutes to even the score at 67-all with 2:55 to play.

Brianna Buchanan gave Barton a 69-67 lead with two free throws and Cougars had an opportunity to push that lead even farther but a 3-pointer by Victoria Carlile missed at the 2:28 mark and Pratt knotted the game for the 6th time with just more than 2 minutes to play. Those free throws by Buchanan would be the final points of the day for the Cougars. Pratt ended the game on a 7-0 run as Barton missed its last 7 shots and committed a turnover in the final 2 1/2 minutes of action. I those same 2 1/2 minutes Pratt turned the ball over 3 times but hit 2-of-3 shots from the floor and 3-of-3 from the free throw line for the win. The difference in the game was at the free throw line where Pratt ended the night 14-of-18 to Barton's 9-of-12.

Buchanan ended with 14 points and Vivian Ewalefo grabbed 14 rebounds to lead the Cougars. Tina Wilson led Pratt with 23 points and Lauren Williams showed why she is one of the top point guards in the West if not the country with a 20-point, 7-assist outing to go along with no turnovers.

Stats
Full box scores and stats can be found at www.bartonccc.edu/sports

Next
Sat., Jan. 8 – at Garden City, 6 pm (Jayhawk West contest at Garden City)