ARKANSAS CITY – Last season, the Barton men’s basketball wasn’t too much of a first half team.
In fact, the Cougars trailed at halftime in 16 of their 26 Jayhawk Conference games. Barton would rally to win most of those, going 21-5 in the Jayhawk.
If one game is any indication, Coach Craig Fletchall won’t need as many antacids tablets at halftime this season.
The Cougars used an early 24-7 run to take complete control against Cowley College and never looked back.
Barton rolled by the Tigers at Scott Auditorium in Arkansas City Saturday night, winning the first conference game of the season, 85-61.
“It was a nice way to start the conference season,” Coach Fletchall said. “We were ready to play from the start tonight.”
Barton is now 1-0 in the Jayhawk and remains the only unbeaten team overall in the conference at 10-0. Cowley is now 8-4 overall and 0-2 in the Jayhawk. Cowley lost 82-78 at Northwest Tech in its Jayhawk opener Wednesday.
Another road tilt will be a bigger challenge for the Cougars Wednesday when they travel to No. 4 Coffeyville.
Saturday, the game wasn’t close for long.
Barton led 6-5 early but followed with a commanding 15-3 run that turned into a 24-7 run to the media timeout to take a 30-12 lead. It was not close after that.
Leondre Washington, the sophomore transfer point guard from Robert Morris, was the catalyst in the run, scoring 10 early points.
At half, the Cougars led 43-23.
Barton put to rest any thought of a comeback by the Tigers, opening the lead up to 27 points in the opening five minutes of the second half. The lead was never less than 20 the rest of the way.
Washington led the Cougars with 21 points followed by Akeem White with 19 points and 12 rebounds. Johns Williams scored 16 and Diovonte Caldwell scored 15.
Dylan Vincent led Cowley with 13.
Next is the trip to Coffeyville to take on the No. 4 team in the nation Wednesday night.
“We will need to be a lot more solid,” Coach Fletchall said of the match up with the Red Ravens. “We can’t turn the ball over as much and we can’t reach on defense as much. Coffeyville will expose us if we do those things there.”
Barton 85, Cowley 61
Barton 43 42 – 85
Cowley 23 38 – 61
