Cougars wrap up home season with win over Cloud
The Barton County Community College men's basketball team concluded its home season with a 70-68 thriller over Cloud County Saturday night at the Barton County Gym. The Cougars led for most of the game before having to rally then hold off the Thunderbirds for the win. Barton moved into a 3rd place in the conference in the loss column with the win at 7-7 in West play and 12-16 overall. Cloud is now 8-7 in the West and 15-13 overall. Barton still has two road games left at Dodge and Seward.

Highlights
Barton bolted out of the gates to a 12-0 lead and held that advantage for most of the contest. Cloud didn't take long to get back in the game, cutting the margin to 14-12. The Cougars pushed that lead back to 28-18 and eventually took a 33-29 lead to the intermission.

The Cougars held that lead until the 13-minute mark of the 2nd half when the T-Birds took a 43-40 lead on a 3-pointer by Reed Hein. It was 1 of 4 teys on the night for guard. Cloud kept that lead over the next 6 minutes, then the two teams traded the lead until 3 straight turnovers by Cloud allowed Barton to go on a 6-0 run and take a 54-48 lead with 4:12 to play. Barton would not trail again.

Cloud did have a chance to take the lead in the final seconds but a missed 3-pointer by Keddric Mays kept the T-Birds from taking the lead. Cloud still had a chance to tie the game when Manourou Gakou was fouled with 3 seconds to play. Gakou missed both free throws to seal the win for Barton.

Four Cougars scored in double figures led by sophomore Aubrey Bruner. Playing in his last home game of the season, Bruner hit 4-of-8 3-pointers on his way to 18 points. The point guard also had 7 assists and no turnovers. Caleb Tegtmeier added 14 points while sophomores Antanas Kavaliauskas and Diogo Salazar each had 13 points. Mays led 4 Cloud players in double figures with 16 points.

Stats
Full box scores and stats can be found at www.bartonccc.edu/sports

Next
Sat., Feb. 26 – v Cloud, 7:30 pm (Jayhawk West contest at the Barton County Gym)

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Check out Barton County Basketball Online at www.bartonccc.edu/sports