Cougars drop road tilt at Butler
The Barton County Community College women's basketball team dropped a 56-49 road decision to Butler County Saturday night at the Power Plant in El Dorado. Despite the loss, the Cougars held onto the 8th and final playoff spot from the Jayhawk West for the upcoming Region VI Tournament. Barton is now 13-15 overall and 3-11 in the West. Butler County is 12-16 overall and still on the outside looking if for the playoffs with a 2-12 West mark.

Highlights
Barton never led in the contest, tying the game twice early but when Butler took an 8-6 lead in the 10:30 to play in the opening half, Barton would not tie the game again. The Cougars were haunted by 13 1st half turnovers as they fell behind 25-19 despite hitting a better percentage from the floor and out-rebounding the Grizzlies.

The Cougars closed the gap to a single digit on several occasions in the 2nd half, the latest coming at 35-34 with 11:29 to play. Barton did get within a basket at 49-47 on a Rebecca Chapman basket with 1:42 to play but a 3-point by Butler quickly pushed the lead back to 5. Barton would get no closer than 5 in the final 1:30 of action.

Those turnovers proved to be the difference in the game for Barton as they out-shot Butler (38 percent to 27 percent) and out-rebounded the Grizzlies (43-33) in two other key stat categories. Barton was led by Akia Harmon with 12 points while Carly Bloomfield and Amber Jeffrey added 10 each. The 10 points were a career-high for the freshman Jeffrey. Bloomfield also had 11 rebounds and 5 assists. Benita Buggs led 3 Butler players in double figures with 16. Asia Alton added 14 and Cecilia Russell-Nava 12.

Stats
Stats can be found at www.bartonccc.edu/sports

Next
Feb. 25 – at Cloud, 6 pm (Jayhawk West contest at the Cloud County Gym)