Barton women dominating in 86-44 Jayhawk West win at Butler

Barton women dominating in 86-44 Jayhawk West win at Butler
The Barton County Community College women's basketball team put forth a dominate effort Saturday night at the Power Plant in El Dorado, rolling by Butler County, 86-44, in Jayhawk West play. The Cougars defense was smothering as it had been early this season, holding Butler to just 27 percent shooting from the field to improve to 4-2 in the West and 18-2 overall this season. Butler is now 0-6 in the West and 5-14 overall. The Cougars will get their 3rd tough road contest – 5th overall in 7 West games – when they travel to Hutchinson Wednesday to take on West co-leader Hutchinson. Hutch is 5-0 in the West and 16-3 overall. Tip will be at 5:30 in the Sports Arena at Hutch.

Highlights
Butler stayed with the No. 16 ranked Cougars for the 1st 8 minutes of the contest, trailing just 9-8 with 12:43 to play. Barton followed with a 12-0 run to take a 21-8 lead over the next 3 minutes and never led by less than double digits the rest of the way. The lead grew to 23 at half, 43-19. Barton led by as many as 45 in the 2nd half before settling for the 42-point win over the Grizzlies.

The Cougar defense held Butler to just 17-of-63 shooting from the floor and limited an opponent to less than 50 points for the 2nd straight game and the 10th time in 20 games this year. Barton also won by more than 30 points for the 11th time this season. The road win was the 1st since a conference opening win at Pratt that was followed by road losses at perennial West powers Cloud County and Seward County.

Five Cougars reached double figures in the win, paced by Ipek Turkyilmaz and Kristine Silaraja with 14 each. Shelby Hillman came off the bench to add 13 – the 2nd highest total of her career at Barton. Courtney Sturdivant and Jessica Halsig each scored 12. Halsig turned in a double double – the 1st of her career – with a career-high 10 rebounds. Halsig also had 5 steals as the sophomore from nearby Wichita turned in her 2nd straight double figure scoring game and 3rd in the last 5 contests. Lakeisha Levi scored 17 to lead Butler.

Barton will look for a big road win Wednesday as they take on a Blue Dragon team that already owns 3 road wins in the West as well as a home win over Seward County. Hutch is currently riding a 9-game winning streak and has not lost since the Shoot Out in early December.

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

Next 
Wed Jan 23 – at Hutch, 5:30 pm (Jayhawk West contest at the Sports Arena in Hutchinson)