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Tough
season comes to an and for Barton men’s basketball
The
Barton County Community College men’s basketball team completed
a tough journey Saturday night, ending what has been a very trying
basketball campaign. The Cougars finished the season with a 69-63
loss to Seward County at the Greenhouse in Liberal. Barton, which
finished with a 13-17 mark, will not participate in the post season
due to self-imposed sanctions by the college. The Cougars did, however,
finish in a tie for 3rd place in the Jayhawk West with an 8-8 conference
mark. Seward County finished 2nd in the West with an 11-5 record
and will take a 22-8 record into Region VI playoff action.
Highlights
Both teams shot the ball extremely well to start the contest for
much of the 1st half both squads were near 60 percent from the floor.
The teams traded leads during the 1st half with Barton taking an
early lead and leading as much as 22-15 halfway through the opening
20 minutes. Seward rallied to take a 27-26 lead then the two team
traded the lead with Seward eventually taking a 38-33 lead to intermission
as both teams hit better than 50 percent from the floor in the opening
half.
Seward
extended that lead to 9 on a couple of occasions in the 2nd half,
the latest coming at 46-37 with 15 minutes to play in the game.
But the Cougars came storming back with an 8-0 started with an Antanas
Kavaliauskas dunk on a fast break pass from Aubrey Bruner then capped
by back-to-back 3-pointers from Caleb Tegtmeier. Seward pushed the
lead back to 7 but Barton worked it all the way and eventually took
a 59-58 lead on Tegtmeier’s 4th 3-pointer of the game with
4:07 to play. Barton was unable to score on its next 4 possessions
however as Seward recaptured the lead and built it to 65-59 in the
final minute.
Kavaliauskas,
playing in his final game as a Cougar, led Barton. The sophomore
finished the game with 22 points and 11 rebound and became the 1st
Barton player since Mark Hutton in 1992 to average double figures
in both scoring and rebounding. Kavaliauskas ended with a 17.4 scoring
average and a 10.0 rebound average.
Bruner,
also playing his final game for Barton, ended with 10 points and
7 assists. Bruner finished his sophomore campaign with an 11.2 point
average and 4.9 assists. In the final 5 games of the year, Bruner
averaged just less than 7 assists per contest. Tegtmeier ended his
freshman campaign with 12 points and finished the season hitting
40 percent of his 3-point attempts. Tegtmeier shot higher than 45
percent on 3’s during Jayhawk West action.
Adam
Turner led Seward with 22 points – 9-of-9 from the free throw
line. Keoni Watson added 17 and Kyle Smith 11 for the Saints. Both
defenses made things tougher in the 2nd half as both shot in the
30 percent in the 2nd half and ended at 48 percent for the game.
Stats
Full box scores and stats can be found at www.bartonccc.edu/sports
Next
Season complete
-30-
Check
out Barton County Basketball Online at www.bartonccc.edu/sports
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