After the Barton Community College women’s basketball team’s dismantling of Dodge City on Wednesday night 76-55, Lady Cougars head coach Darin Spence said that his team has been growing. 
“I was really pleased with how we came out and got after them,” Spence said of the game against Dodge. “I thought we were really good defensively. In our league home games in the past, we didn’t come out and start very well. We had to fight back.
“This was actually a little harder because we had already beat them at their place, so that shows a lot of growth on our part to bounce back and really batter. I’m encouraged of just focusing on what we control is really starting to take hold.”
If that’s so, than the team is growing at the perfect time.
Barton travels to Garden City on Saturday. The game begins at 5:30 p.m.
The Lady Cougars are 15-9 overall, 5-5 in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference Western Division. They sit in fifth in the West standings behind Garden City.
Garden City is 14-10 overall, 6-4 in the conference, meaning that a win against the Lady Broncbusters would give Barton a share of fourth place with Garden City in the standings.
“If we can go get one at Garden, it jumps us all the way to a tie for fourth,” Spence said. “We have a tiebreaker because we beat the second-place team (Seward). So there’s a lot to play for still. We can still finish as high as second. If something happens to Seward. If they lose some, we’re right there. We’re just going to keep trying to work hard and keep getting better.”
Hutchinson, which is ranked No. 2 in the latest NJCAA poll, remains on top of the Jayhawk West standings, sitting at 23-0, 10-0. Seward County, which is ranked No. 11, is second with a record of 19-4, 8-2.
Wednesday night’s victory was a joint effort for the Lady Cougars, with four players in double figures and all 10 players scoring points.
Dionne Harris is still Barton’s points leader with 13.6 points per game. She also leads in rebounds (170). Harris, who has had trouble staying out of foul trouble in the first half of games thus far, finished the first half against the Lady Conquistadors with only one foul.
Point guard Erin Copeland leads the Lady Cougars in assists with 104 and averages 6.8 points per game.
Blair Bloomfield’s points per game average has been steadily climbing, reaching 9.3 after she finished with 11 points against the Lady Conqs. Bloomfield also recorded a double-double last Saturday against Seward County, a 62-57 win in which she scored 22 points and grabbed 10 rebounds.
Garden City’s leading scorer is Tamara Jones, who averages 17.3 points per game. She also leads in rebounds with 9.1 per game and blocks with 29.
Ashley Walker joins her in averaging double figures with 10 points per game.
Garden City traveled to Barton on Jan. 11, a 62-51 loss for the Lady Cougars. It was part of a four-game home losing skid in conference play that was shattered on Wednesday night.
“You know, as disappointing as the other three games were, and I’m not talking about the Hutch game,” Spence said, “but Seward, Garden and Pratt, we had such poor starts, but we fought back in and actually had the games tied. So we know what we did. We’ve just got to get out, and yeah, we’re growing. It’s just frustrating. It’s disappointing that you have those losses, but sometimes you’ve got to go through stuff like that to really learn.”