Lady Cougars knock off #3 ranked team in the nation

The Barton Community College women's basketball team knocked off No. 3 ranked Independence Community College 63-61 Saturday night in the Best Western Angus Inn Classic held at Barton.  The Lady Cougars overcame a ten-point second half deficit to defeat the previously undefeated Pirates.  With the win the Lady Cougars end the first half of their season and head to Christmas break with a 10-4 record.  Barton will next play on January 4 against Seward County Community College in Jayhawk Conference openers for both teams.

Highlights 
Neither team was able to gain much of a lead until Barton surged ahead with seven minutes remaining in the first half.  A Netanya Jackson bucket would start an 8-0 run in the next three minutes to give the Lady Cougars a 25-18 advantage.  Independence would strike back keyed by two three-pointers by Indy's Kelby McGrath.  McGrath would make four of her five three point attempts in the first half as Independence outscored the Lady Cougars 13-0 the last five minutes to lead 31-25 at the half.

After Independence extended their lead to ten points in the first two minutes of the second half, Dionne Harris would score the next six points to draw Barton to within four.  After a pair of Indy free throws, Devan Boeger cut the deficit in half by draining a three-pointer.  Indy would stretch their lead to nine twice with the last coming with 9:52 remaining. 

After a pair of Blair Bloomfield free throws cut the deficit to seven, the game became the Dionne Harris show.  Harris would score ten of the Lady Cougars' next twelve points and keyed an 18-1 run to give Barton an eight point lead at 56-48 with 4:39 remaining.  Indy would answer with 6-0 run behind the play of Diara Moore to cut the Barton advantage to just two with 2:15 remaining.

After a Barton timeout, Shea Shoemaker had perhaps the game's biggest basket.  As the shot clock was winding down and seemingly trapped in the corner in front of the Barton bench, Shoemaker drove baseline past two Pirate defenders to nail an eight foot jumper to extend the Barton lead to 4.  After a Dominique Mosley bucket drew Indy back to within two just seventeen seconds later, it was again Harris who came up with more big plays. 

After grabbing two offensive rebounds off her own miss amongst three Indy players, Harris would eventually get fouled where she would make one-of-two free throws to give Barton a three point lead.  Harris would add another free throw with twenty-nine seconds remaining after being fouled rebounding a Mosley missed shot.  With Barton holding a seemingly safe four point lead, Indy's Moore drove the lane drawing a Harris foul and completed the three-point play to narrow Barton's margin to 62-61 with just nineteen seconds to play. 

Amongst full court Pirate pressure, Erin Copeland would give a two point lead by making the first of her one-of-two free throws with ten seconds remaining.  After an Indy timeout, Copeland would miss the second free throw giving Indy a chance to tie the game.  The Pirates Kamri Anderson dribbled up court and tried to throw a lob pass into Shaqilla Curtis but Bloomfield went high to deflect the ball.  The loose ball was eventually picked up by Copeland and Barton held on as time expired for the 63-61 victory.

Scoring 
Leading the Lady Cougars in scoring was Harris with twenty-three points, eighteen coming in the second half, while also grabbing eleven rebounds, six coming from the offensive end.  Shoemaker was the only other Barton player in double-digit scoring with ten but Bloomfield contributed eight points to go along with her ten rebounds.  

Moore led three Pirates in double-digit scoring with sixteen.  McGrath, who scored all of her points in the first half, scored twelve while Mosley contributed ten to go along with her twelve rebounds.

Statistics