Another hot shooting night and balanced scoring led Barton Community College men's basketball team to its fourth straight victory holding off a pesky Pratt Community College team 100-90 on Hall of Fame night Saturday at the Barton Gym. Shooting over 50% in the first half but finding itself trailing by three at the break, the Cougars took it up a notch shooting nearly 58% in scoring fifty-five second half points. Six Cougars scored eleven or more points as the Jayhawk West's leading scoring team scored 100 or more for the seventh time on the season and third time in seven conference games. Barton improves to 6-1 in Jayhawk Conference play and 18-3 overall while dropping Pratt to 3-4 and 12-9. Next up for the Cougars will be a trip to Concordia on Wednesday to take on Cloud County Community College in an 8:00 p.m. tip at Bryant Gymnasium.
Ahmad Walker's third straight double-double performance led the six Cougars reaching double figures. Returning from a two-game absence, the sophomore scored twenty-four points on 6-of-11 from the field and a perfect 12-of-12 from the charity stripe while hauling down a career high thirteen rebounds for his sixth double-double of the season. Walker also led the team with four assists and shared team high steal honors with Tyrone Acuff with three each. The silent assassin Kenny Enoch had another solid night knocking down 4-of-6 from long range to finish with eighteen points. Jalin Barnes put up seventeen with seven rebounds while Christian Smith came off the bench for fifteen. Acuff and reserve Khalil Gracey each scored eleven each while Eddie Hunt rounded out the remaining Barton scoring with four points.
Vladimir Brodziansky's double-double twenty-three points and thirteen rebounds led Pratt as three players reached double digit scoring. Taylor Schieber added nineteen while Rob Davis, who nailed a game winning three pointer against the Cougar last year at the Barton Gym, finished with seventeen. Coming off the bench Dennis Jones led the Beavers in assists with six.
Preceding Saturday's game was the on-court recognition of three inductees into the Barton Sports Hall of Fame. Headlined by former Cougar basketball point guard Gene Butler, fellow 2015 inductees Jeff Christy and Ryan "Pete" Manely were joined and recognized at center court by current Hall of Fame members.
Butler was the "straw that stirred the drink" in the 1990-92 seasons for the high flying Cougars helping Barton to a third place national finish in 1991 and stands amongst the school charts in assists for all assist categories. An All-Conference catcher at Barton during the 2002-04 seasons and repeating the feats at the University of Nebraska, Christy was drafted twice in the Major League Draft reaching the Triple-A level with the Minnesota Twins organization. Manely's induction marked the first student-athletic trainer to receive the honor as he continues a successful athletic training career at Sterling College.