CONCORDIA— The road did not give the Barton Community College team the result it was looking for.

Trying to snap an 8-game losing skid and fresh off a heartbreaking home loss to Colby, the Cougars were looking to regroup in Concordia Saturday.

It wasn’t too be as Cloud County defeated Barton, 25-17, 25-22, 25-18 in Jayhawk West play. The loss dropped the Cougars to 2-4 in the West and 5-12 overall. Cloud is now 4-2 and sitting in third in the West. The Thunderbirds are 9-6 overall.

“We used a new lineup configuration against Cloud and we got some better results in serve reception,” Barton coach Phil Shoemaker said. “Nathalia Gouveia and Lydia Konrade each played a big role in that improvement but our blocking may have been negatively affected.”

Barton finished the match without its top attacker, Olivia Naccarato, who was injured during the match.

Cloud was only threatened in the second set during the afternoon as the Thunderbirds try to keep pace with the leaders in the West. Barton is sitting in seventh in the West, a half game out of sixth and 1 1/2 from fourth.

“Cloud is an offensively efficient team and they had their way with us for the most part,” Shoemaker said. “Our block was a step slow which caused us a lot of problems. Certainly something to keep working on along with our back court defense.”

Barton was led in hitting by Brooke Joslyn with seven kills on 11 attempts with no errors for a .636 effort. Nathalia Gouveia added six kills and Jordan Edelman five. Lydia Konrade had eight digs to pace the Cougars and Mallory McQueen had 21 assists.

“Brooke had a nice match offensively hitting at a .636 clip,” coach Shoemaker said. “But when Olivia Naccarato was injured (she took a knee to the head during a defensive play) it took our number one attacker and blocker out which was a significant blow to our chances. At times we competed well but we could not match Cloud’s attack and our defense did not hold up under their barrage.”

The Cougars are back in West action Wednesday against the team at the top of the conference. No. 7 Hutchinson will come to the Barton Gym for a 6:30 p.m. start. Hutchinson has not lost in West play at 5-0. The Blue Dragons are 12-1 overall with the only loss to No. 1 Southern Idaho in Twin Falls, Idaho.