CONCORDIA, Kan. – Behind a total of 64 points from the starting five, the Cloud County Community College women's basketball team would account for all but 10 points of the team total while leading wire-to-wire as part of a 74-51 home win over Coffeyville Community College to give head coach Brett Erkenbrack his 700th career win inside Arley Bryant Gymnasium on Wednesday, January 5th.
 
A second-straight win for CCCC moves the T-Birds to 8-7 overall and 4-5 in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference while Coffeyville drops to 11-4 overall and 5-4 in the KJCCC.
 
Grabbing an early lead in the opening 90 seconds of the game, the T-Birds would turn to sophomore Kay Hauata Phillips who would score six of the game's first eight points to put Cloud County out in front by a score of 6-2 before seeing the Red Ravens manage to tie things up at 6-6 with 7:07 left in the first quarter. A Makayla Twyman three would put Cloud County back out in front as the T-Birds would go on a 13-0 run that would be capped off by a Paula Puzule trey with 2:25 left in the opening period. The scoring drought for Coffeyville would end with 2:08 remaining as a three-point play would get the Red Ravens back within 10 at 19-9, but Cloud County would manage to put up five points in the final minutes including a breakaway opportunity with two seconds left to make it 24-9 after one-quarter of action.
 
Offensive output would slow down for the T-Birds in the second frame as the Red Ravens would score seven of the first 12 points to try and cut into the Cloud County lead before seeing back-to-back buckets give CCCC their largest lead of the first half at 33-16. Six of the next eight points would be scored by Coffeyville's Faith Simpson as the third-year sophomore would account for nearly 60 percent of the Red Raven offense in the first half. Holding onto a 39-24 lead with 3:10 left before halftime, Cloud County would then be held scoreless the rest of the half as Coffeyville would cut the once 17-point lead down to 10 to make it a 39-29 contest at the break.
 
A quick start to the second half by Cloud County would see the T-Birds put up nine points in the first three minutes of the third quarter to push their lead back out to 14 at 48-34. A Twyman triple two minutes later would extend the lead to 15 at 53-38 before seeing CCCC extend their lead to 20 at 61-41 on a Phillips jumper with 1:14 left in the quarter. Coffeyville would be held to just one field goal in the final three-plus minutes of the third as the T-Birds would look to put the game away early with Twyman getting a shot off right before the clock ran out that would drop and make it a 63-41 lead heading to the fourth.
 
Trading the first eight buckets of the final quarter of action, Cloud County would never allow Coffeyville to make a run to try and close the gap as the lead would never fall below 20 in the final 10 minutes of action. Matching the scoring output from the Red Ravens through the first six minutes of the quarter, Cloud County would manage to score five of the final eight points and hold Coffeyville to just five points in the final seven minutes of the game to comfortably earn their second-straight victory of 20 or more points.
 
Outscoring Coffeyville in the first, third, and fourth quarters, Cloud County would lead by as many as 25 points in the contest and outscore the Red Ravens 24-12 in points off turnovers to go along with a 16-4 advantage in second-chance points. As a team, CCCC would shoot 52.5 percent (31-of-59) from the field and hit on eight-of-20 (40.0 percent) of their shots from beyond the arc while attempting just seven free throws (four-of-seven, 57.1 percent). Coffeyville would be held to a 35.7 percent (20-of-56) performance while going four-of-17 (23.5 percent) from deep and seven-of-11 (63.6 percent) from the charity stripe.
 
Netting a team-high and new career-high would be Twyman as the freshman would drain five triples and grab six rebound to go with four assists. Phillips would have a big night by going for 16 points and six rebounds despite playing just 22 minutes due to foul trouble to join Te Araroa Sopoaga and Puzule who both finished with 10 points. Kennedy Becker would add seven points and 11 rebounds off the bench, accounting for seven of CCCC's 10 bench points. The Red Ravens were led by a game-high 24 points from Simpson who has averaged over 18 points per contest in her three games inside Arley Bryant Gymnasium.
 
What's Next?
Saturday will see Cloud County head west to Garden City to take on a 10-3 Lady Broncbuster team that has not played outside competition since December 13th. Winners of three of their last four games, GCCC is 5-3 in conference play as their originally scheduled Wednesday evening contest at Pratt was postponed due to health and safety protocols within the Beaver program. The meeting will be the first for Cloud County against Garden City since last year's NJCAA Region VI Tournament opening game that was originally a 63-43 Lady Broncbuster win before being vacated by Garden City due to a clerical error that was found after the season.