Cougars season ends in Region VI finals for 2nd straight season

Cougars season ends in Region VI finals for 2nd straight season
The Barton County Community College women's basketball team made its 1st return trip to the Region VI finals for the 1st time in nearly 20 years, but once again, the Cougars season came to an end there. Barton's quest for a return trip to the NJCAA Tournament for the 1st time since 2000 will have to wait at least one more year. Barton's season ended when Colby defeated the Cougars, 67-62, in the Region VI title game Tuesday night at Koch Arena in Wichita. Barton ends its season with a 28-6 record while Colby, 31-3, moves on the to the NJCAA National Tournament for the 1st time in school history. The Cougars 28 wins give Coach Lane Lord 50 wins in his two seasons at the helm of the Cougars. The game was the final contest for 11 sophomores on the Cougars' roster, 8 of which were playing in their 2nd season at Barton.

Highlights
Barton fell behind in the game early and spent the entire game playing catch-up with the Trojans. With the game tied at 6-all, Colby went on a 7-0 to take a 13-6 lead. Barton would not catch the Trojans again, but made it very interesting at time and had a chance to even the score late in the game.

Colby led by as many as 13 in the 1st half before the Cougars were able to put together a little run late in the half and trim that halftime margin to just 7 at 34-27. It was a half that saw Barton shoot just 32 percent from the floor while Colby hit just under 50 percent. Barton was only able to force Colby into 7 1st half turnovers – a category the Cougars average nearly 26 forced turnovers a game.

In the 2nd half, Barton trimmed the lead to 38-33 just 2 minutes into the half, but stayed on 33 points for quite a while. In fact, it was nearly 5 minutes the Cougars went without a single point as Colby built its biggest lead of the game at 47-33 with 13:35 to play. Down by 14, Barton began to find its game. The Cougars, spurred once again by sophomore Brianna Buchanan, began their comeback. Buchanan started it with back-to-back treys to make it 47-39. Stephanie N'Garsanet followed with two free throws and a jumper then Buchanan added a floater on the right side and Barton had completed a 12-0 in just 2 minutes of play. That put the Cougars back in the game, trailing just 47-45. The Cougars had 3 straight possessions to either tie the score or take the lead, but came up short.

Colby built the lead back to 9 with 6 minutes to play but Buchanan again knocked down a 3-pointer to make it 58-52 with just under 6 minutes left. Another Buchanan trey at the 4:18 mark made it 58-55. Colby would hold its lead of 2-5 points into the final minute of action. N'Garsanet made it 64-62 with 30 seconds to play and after Colby hit 1-of-2 free throws, the Cougars has one last chance to tie the contest. This time Buchanan couldn't knock down the 3-pointer with 8 seconds to play and Colby added a pair of free throws for the final 5-point difference.

Buchanan led Barton with 22 points, followed by N'Garsanet with 12. Andrea Barber added 9 points and 5 assists while Maya Onikute led Barton with 9 rebounds. Barton hit nearly 50 from the floor in the 2nd half to up its percentage to 40 percent for the game. Barton did end the game with 19 points off just 16 Colby turnovers but that advantage was limited as Colby scored 13 off Cougars miscues. Rita Kollo led 3 Colby players in double figures with 16.

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

Next
Season complete with 28-6 record.