Playing in The Greenhouse is never fun for an opponent but the Barton Volleyball put up a good fight Wednesday night in Liberal before succumbing to No. 4 ranked Seward County Community College in four sets. After dropping the first 25-12, the Cougars handed the Saints their first set loss at home all season with a 25-20 win before Seward County regrouped in finishing off the final two sets 25-17 and 25-10. The loss drops the Cougars into sixth place in the conference standings at 6-8 and 14-13 while Seward County solidifies their top spot with an unblemished 13-0 mark improving to 28-1 on the year. Barton will step out of conference play on Saturday with a twin bill in Hesston, Kansas, beginning with a match against host Hesston College at 10:00 a.m. followed by a noon first serve against Southeast Community College. The Cougars will then play its final home match of the season on Monday in welcoming Dodge City Community College to the Barton Gym.

"With the exception of the first set, I thought we played really hard," said Head Coach Brandon Stephenson. "Our adjustment to how they were going to play us was big after the first set and credit Seward for taking us out of position at key times of the match. We added to that challenge with our serving and serve receiving which really hurt us in the final two sets but overall we had good effort tonight."