2nd half pushes Dodge by Cougars; Barton clinging to home playoff spot

2nd half pushes Dodge by Cougars; Barton clinging to home playoff spot
The Barton County Community College women's basketball team saw Dodge City hit high gear in the 2nd half Wednesday night at the Civic Center in Dodge City. That resulted in the Conquistadors storming from behind to pick up big Jayhawk West win, 85-76. Dodge City scored 59 2nd half points to turn a Barton halftime lead into the win. Barton is still holding the final home playoff spot in the Jayhawk West with one game to go. Barton is now 9-6 in the West and 19-10 overall. Dodge City moves to 11-4 and 24-5. Barton will travel to West champion Seward County to wrap up the regular season Saturday.

Highlights 
Barton led nearly the entire 1st half of basketball and looked to be on its way to a share of 2nd place in the Jayhawk West in the early stages of the 2nd half. But it all came apart as Dodge City blistered the nets in the 2nd half to the tune of 59 points and 72 percent shooting. The Conqs, who missed just 9 shots the entire 2nd half (23-of-32), ended the contest hitting 60 percent from the field – a season-high allowed by Barton. In fact it was just the 2nd time this year a team has hit higher than 50 percent from the floor against the Cougars defense.

Dodge led most of the 1st 10 minutes of the contest but Barton overtook the Conquistadors on a Brandi Harris jumper with 9:41 to play in the half and Barton would lead the rest of the half. The Cougars put together a 12-3 run to take a 26-17 lead on Dodge with 5:24 left in the opening half. Barton held that advantage, taking a 35-26 lead to intermission as they held Dodge to just 1 trey, forced 14 Dodge turnovers and outrebounded the Conqs by a 23-11 margin.

That lead grew to a game-high 11 points for Barton early in the 2nd half twice, the latest at 41-30 with 18:50 to play. But Dodge kept up the offensive pressure behind the court play of Taleesha Hardy and the shooting of Anna Nimz. Dodge scored on its 1st 5 possessions and 10 of the 1st 13 possessions of the half to overtake Barton at 49-45 with 13:55 to play. Nimz scored 13 of the 23 points in the run. Dodge continued to score nearly at will on Barton until the lead was 58-46 at the 11-minute mark. That is when Barton tried to come back. The Cougars were able to stop the bleeding – and a 32-11 run to that point in the half – by holding serve with Dodge over the next several minutes. The Cougars were able to get the margin to 8 on several occasions but didn't get any closer until Barton cut it to 78-71 with 1:51 to play – a little too little, too late.

Mayowa Onikute scored a career-high 22 points and grabbed a career-high 8 rebounds for the Cougars from her point guard spot. She paced three Cougars in double digits as Harris (12) and Vivian Ewalefo (10) joined her. Nimz finished with 26 for Dodge and Hardy added 20 as Dodge City moved closer clinching the 2nd seed in the West.

Barton will host a 1st round playoff game with a win over Seward Saturday in the season finale or a Hutchinson loss to Dodge City. If the Cougars are the No. 4 seed, they will host Fort Scott or Neosho County. If Barton falls to the No. 5 seed, they will travel to Independence for an opening round game.

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

Next
Sat., March 5 – at Seward County, 6 pm (Jayhawk West contest at the Greenhouse in Liberal)