Cougars title hopes end with semifinal loss to No. 1 Central Arizona

Cougars title hopes end with semifinal loss to No. 1 Central Arizona
The Barton County Community College women's basketball team saw its dreams of a national title come to an end with a loss to the No. 1 team in the nation, Central Arizona. The Cougars were beaten by the top seed in the NJCAA National Tournament, 78-56, at the Bicentennial Center in Salina Friday night. Barton will now play for 3rd place Saturday against Arkansas-Fort Smith. The loss drops the Cougars to 34-3 on the season while Central Arizona improves to 34-0. The Cougars are still in position to record the most wins in school history and captured the highest finish ever at the NJCAA tournament for the school with a win over Fort Smith (33-2) in the 3rd place contest today at 5 pm.

Highlights
The match-up zone defense of the Cougars that had limited teams to 50 points a game during the season and just 45 points a game in the playoffs met its match Friday night. Central Arizona scored the most points Barton had allowed all season with 78. The 49 percent the Vaqueras shot from the field was also the highest field goal percentage allowed all season the 1st time in 19 games a team had shot higher than 40 percent from the field against the Cougars.

Central Arizona jumped to an 11-0 lead on Barton in the 1st 3 minutes and the Vaqueras never trailed. Barton hung around whittling the lead to 5 on a couple of occasions and trailed just 36-31 with 2 minutes left in the opening half. But offensive rebounds allowed Central Arizona 4 cracks at a basket before eventually getting fouled making a pair of free throws for a 7-point lead. A big blow was delivered by Central Arizona's Lonnie Sanchez to end the half when she knocked down a 3-pointer with 9 seconds to play for a 41-31 lead at intermission.

Central Arizona led by double figures the entire 2nd half, scoring the 1st 4 points out of the gates in the 2nd half. The Vaqueras led by as many as 25 in the game.

The Cougars put 3 players in double figures, led by Ipek Turkyilmaz and Kristine Silaraja with 13 each. Courtney Sturdivant added 12. Ashley Sours scored 23 points and grabbed 13 rebounds to pace Central Arizona and she was joined in a double-double by point guard Tenaya Watson who scored 16 points and handed out 10 assists.

Barton will conclude the season today with the No. 2 ranked team in the nation in Arkansas-Fort Smith.

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

Next 
Sat March 22 – v Arkansas-Fort Smith, 5 pm (NJCAA National Championship 3rd place game at the Bicentennial Center in Salina)