Once the nation's No. 3 ranked Hutchinson Community College got warmed up, the Lady Dragons took control Wednesday night at the Barton Gym to defeat Barton Community College 78-52. The Lady Dragons out rebounded Barton by thirty and outscored the Lady Cougars by twenty-two points in the paint to remain undefeated on the season. Barton drops to 3-3 in conference play and 15-7 overall while Hutchinson improves to 6-0 and 20-0 overall. The Lady Cougars will begin a two game road conference stretch beginning Saturday at Garden City Community College in a 5:30 p.m. contest. After a trip to Dodge City Community College on Wednesday, the Lady Cougars return for a home contest on Saturday, February 8, against Cloud County Community College.
Consecutive buckets in the point by Barton's Ashton Bruner capped a 8-0 first half run to give Barton a 15-12 lead with 10:46 to play. Following a Chelsea Dewey shot to draw the Lady Dragons back to within one, a pair of Phikala Anthony free throws pushed the Barton lead back out to three only to have Dewey respond with another bucket with 9:32 remaining in the half.
With both teams unable to find the twine in almost three minutes of play, a pair of Dewey free throws began a 13-0 Hutchinson run as the Lady Dragons warmed up and raced out to a 27-17 lead with just under four minutes remaining in the half. Barton was unable to recover from that point forward as Hutchinson went to the locker room with a 38-25 lead.
Hutchinson kept the momentum rolling in the second half, building the lead out to thirty points twice. A late 4-0 run was too little too late as the Lady Dragons never allowed Barton to string together points for any significant run.
Mariana Lambert came off the bench to score fifteen, including a 4-of-6 performance from beyond the arc, to be the lone Lady Cougar to reach double figures. Leading scorer and rebounder Cheyenne Hedrington was held six points below her average to finish with nine points and grab only two rebounds. Kailai Branter and Ashton Bruner also contributed nine points while sharing the team lead in steals with three each. Brantner also led in assists, dishing out four of Barton's seven.
Hutchinson was led by Jamie Patrick's seventeen points as three Lady Dragons reached double figures and three others scored eight or more. Jen'Von'Ta Hill scored thirteen points and led Hutchinson with a solid all-around game dishing out a team high six assists and grabbing eight rebounds. Going 5-of-6 from the field, Chelsea Dewey also reached double figures finishing with thirteen points. Kalani Purcell had a monster night on the boards grabbing six offensive rebounds to finish with a team high twenty while also scoring nine points, two blocks, and leading the team with four assists.