GOODLAND – For the first time in the long history of the Barton men’s basketball team, the Cougars played at the Max Jones Fieldhouse.

Barton traveled to Goodland to take on the newest member of the Jayhawk Conference in a key game of the season. 

The Cougars were coming off just their third loss of the season. Awaiting them next is the No. 13 team in the nation albeit a No. 13 team now coming off a loss.

Barton did what it needed, getting out of Goodland with an 80-71 win.

Barton is now 7-3 in the Jayhawk West and 16-3 overall. NW Tech is 2-9 and 10-10. Seward leads the West at 9-2 after its loss at Colby while Hutchinson is 8-3 and Colby 6-4.

Barton looked like it was in jeopardy of taking a 2-game losing streak to Seward this weekend, trailing Northwest Tech 39-35 at half.

But the Cougars came out rolling to start the second half. Elijah Ford tied it at 39-all just more than one minute into the final 20 minutes.

Diovonte Caldwell then went bank shot 3-pointer to give Barton a 42-39 lead. Breontae Hunt’s layup made it a 9-0 run and Barton had matched its biggest lead at 44-39 with 16:17 left in the game.

A Ford tip-in made pushed the run to 11-0 before NW Tech finally got its first points of the second half with 15:24 left.

Another trey from Caldwell, this time without the bank, made it 55-47 at the 12:37 mark. A steal and bucket by Ford gave him 20 points and gave Barton a 59-49 lead.

The Cougars would be in control until a 6-0 run NW Tech cut the lead to 63-58 with 4:57 to play in game.

Neither team scored the next 2-plus minutes before Akeem White finally broke the drought with a pair of free throws for a 65-58 lead with 2:45 left. It was the first points for Barton in more than seven minutes.

Barton put the game away at the free throw line, hitting 7-for-8 in the final 1:14 to secure the win.

Ford led Barton with 27 points. Caldwell scored 11 of his 13 in the second half while Williams scored all 13 of his points in the first half.

The Cougars will now head to Liberal to take on No. 13 Seward County Saturday at the Green House. 

Seward is ranked No. 13 in the nation. But the Saints lost 77-72 at Colby Wednesday night. Tip will be 8 p.m. 

Barton 80, NW Tech 71

Barton      35  45 – 80

NW Tech  39  32 – 71

Barton (16-3, 7-3) 80

Ford 27, Caldwell 13, Williams 13, White 5, Morris 5, Andrews 6, Johnson 2, Washington 2.

NW Tech (10-10, 2-9) 71