It was a slow start on sophomore night at the Barton Gym Wednesday but once the Barton Community College women's basketball team got rolling it was lights out for the Conquistadors of Dodge City Community College as the Cougars rolled to a 73-38 victory.
The victory to close out regular season play clinched Barton a share of second place in the Jayhawk West standings at 16-5 and earns the West's second seed in the upcoming Region VI playoffs. Dodge City slips to 5-16 in the league and 6-16 overall for the West's seventh seed.
Now 17-5 on the year, Barton earned home court advantage for the first two rounds of the post-season should they first win Monday's 5:30 p.m. opening round game versus Allen Community College.
Vanessa Oduah led all scorers on the night with 20 points, knocking down the first of her three triples in the Cougars' 10-0 run to evaporate the Conquistadors scoring the opening seven points of the contest.
Fellow sophomore Bryn Willt got the Cougars' scoring started on the night draining a left wing trey in front of the Dodge City bench as Brennan Kirchhoff's fastbreak layup, Oduah's triple, and Lyndi Rumford's jumper put Barton out in front for good.
Barton doubled up the Conquistador for the first time coming at 18-12 as Rumford drained her lone attempt behind the arc and Queen Ulabo scored the next four points on the way to a 19 point night. Ulabo also added 10 rebounds to her 25 minute court time in posting her 8th double-double of the year.
Tiffany Dortland added 16 points with Rumford taking the all-around award of the night with 7 points, 7 rebounds, and dishing out a team leading 6 assists.
The Cougars outscored Dodge City 21-5 in closing out the first quarter before tacking on fourteen more to the margin in the second frame by holding the Conquistadors to a lone three-pointer coming at the 6:25 mark.
Ulabo's buzzer beating three-pointer to end the third quarter increased the margin by seven to a 31-point advantage. Barton held a 30+ point gap most of the final ten minutes with Cora Anderson's personal 4-0 run giving Barton its largest at 73-34 with 3:41 to play.
Emery Maze was the lone Conquistador to reach double-figures in scoring 11 points, nine coming from 3-of-5 shooting from behind the arc.