A final shot rimmed out at the buzzer epitomized a cold shooting night leaving the Barton Community College women's basketball team on the short end of a 71-69 defeat to Howard College in day one of the Best Western/Cougar Booster Club Classic.
Closing to within one following Brennan Kirchhoff's triple with six seconds left, Howard left the door open with a 1-of-2 trip to the line. Advancing the ball to mid-court on a timeout with 3.4 seconds left, Lili Shubert's potential game tying inside jumper among traffic missed its mark as the buzzer sounded.
Barton drops to 3-2 on the season while Howard improves to 3-2. The Cougars will look to bounce back in Saturday's 5:30 p.m. contest against Division II 5th ranked Labette. Howard will play Saturday's 1:00 p.m. game against 20th ranked Hutchinson as the Blue Dragons will be riding high after a come-from-behind 58-55 win over Labette in the Classic's opening game.
RECAP
Howard came out on fire, knocking down seven of their first ten shots including 3-of-5 in building a 17-9 lead to the 4:20 media timeout. A pair of 1-of-2 Barton trips to the line cut the deficit to seven but it was as close as the Cougars could come as the Hawks' fourth three pointer of the opening frame followed by a late bucket gave Howard a 27-16 lead.
Five straight by the Cougars, including four points from Cora Anderson, sliced the gap to six to open the second frame. Following a Howard jumper, Acorionna Lard buried a trey in front of the Hawk bench then following a defensive stand, Anderson and Dayjsha Fanning jumpers drew Barton to within one behind a 12-2 stretch at 29-28 with 4:19 left. The Hawks connected on their first possession out of the timeout but Barton countered with the next four on Mikaela Hall's tough inside bucket and Anderson's ten foot jumper putting the Cougars up 32-31 at the three minute mark, the first lead since Jenny Nkem Womsi's opening bucket. Howard quickly regained the lead on the next possession but the Cougars put the final three points on the board from Morgan Meyers' triple with twenty-five seconds remaining sending Barton to the break ahead 35-33.
Anderson hauled down six rebounds in the second quarter as Barton shot just 37.1% in the opening twenty points. Howard cooled off from its hot start and 55.6% first quarter shooting to just 18.8% on 3-of-16 shots to settle in at 38.2% for the half.
In a grind it out third quarter, the Cougars opened up their largest lead of nine points three minutes into the frame on a 10-2 stretch. A 13-2 Hawk response included an 8-0 spurt putting the visitors back in front 49-47 before Alissa Heskamp canned a trey flipping Barton ahead into the final quarter.
The teams traded baskets for the first minute before three Barton turnovers and missed possessions in the next three minutes, in addition to a pair of Hawk three-pointers, put the Cougars fighting from behind the rest of the night. Cutting the margin to four twice in the next two minutes, consecutive three-balls from Kirchhoff and Lard sliced the deficit to three with 38 seconds remaining before the Hawks helped set up the final seven seconds of dramatics following their 1-of-2 trip to the line.
STATS
Kirchhoff's 3-of-5 from long range contributed to 14 points to lead three Cougars in double-figures. Lard finished with a solid all-around game coming off the bench, scoring 13 points, dishing out a team high 6 assists and grabbing 5 rebounds. Fanning posted her third double-double of the year, recording 12 points and 10 rebounds, to go along with four assists and a game high three steals. Anderson finished with nine points and eight rebounds leading a Barton 27 rebound advantage.
Charnay Robinson led all players with 23 points including burying two of her four three-pointers in the final quarter and grabbed a team high eight rebounds. Shooting 5-of-9 from behind the arc and also canning a pair in the fourth quarter, Kaeona Marquez was close behind with 21 points while Daniela Perdomo contributed 13 points.
Countering Barton's huge rebound advantage, Howard shot 44.8% for the game in shaking off an 18.8% second quarter by eclipsing 50% in the other three quarters. Barton stayed steadily cold throughout the night shooting a season low 36.5%.