COLBY, Kan. – A three-point barrage combined with first-half shooting struggles would put the Cloud County Community College men's basketball team in a 37-29 halftime hole that the T-Birds would not be able to recover from in an 80-71 road loss at Colby Community College to end their season in the first round of the NJCAA Region VI Tournament at the Colby Events Center in Colby, Kansas on Saturday, February 26th.
With the loss, Cloud County will end their season with a 14-17 overall record under first-year head coach
Devin Kastrup while Colby will extend their season for at least one more game as the Trojans improve to 16-14 overall and will travel to Dodge City on Tuesday for an NJCAA Region VI Tournament quarterfinal matchup.
Colby would turn to their outside shot from opening possession of the game as a triple from JJ White would put the Trojans out in front as Cloud County would go nearly the opening two minutes of the game without a made field goal. With the score 8-3 in favor of Colby, the Trojans would get an Ahmad Johnson triple with 16:32 left in the first half to take their largest lead of the half as the T-Birds would call a timeout to try and slow down building momentum that was in favor of Colby.
Out of the timeout, Cloud County would respond with a
Joe Kearney triple to get back within five before getting a
Zion Obanla offensive rebound and put back to make it 11-8 with 15:24 left in the first period. A three-point play for Colby would put the lead back at six for the Trojans as the lead would continue to bounce back and forth between four and six minutes for the next five minutes of game action.
Trailing 16-10 mid-way through the half, Cloud County would get a
Nate Duckworth triple to pull back within three before a three-point play from the Bloomington, Illinois native would pull the T-Birds within two after Colby would get a bucket of their own between the six-point spurt from Duckworth. A timely triple however from Colby would give the Trojans a two-possession lead once again however as the lead would grow back up to as many as seven at 23-16 with 7:18 left in the half as Cloud County would be unable to get a stop for an opportunity at taking the lead.
Following the Colby basket that would put CCCC in a seven-point hole, the T-Birds would respond with four-straight points from Duckworth before a
Justin Graham pair of free throws would make it a one-point contest at 23-22 as Cloud County would appear poised to finally grab their first lead of the game. Once again, however, Colby would have a response as eight of the next 10 points would be scored by Colby to push the lead back out to seven with just over two minutes left before halftime. Despite five points in the final 2:19 of the half from Cloud County which would include a Jalen Treml jumper to get the T-Birds within three at 32-29, Colby would end the half by scoring the final five points of the half to match their largest lead of the first half at the break to hold a 37-29 lead at the end of the period.
Six-straight empty possessions would lead to the first 1:38 of the second half going scoreless between the two teams as Duckworth would finally break what would become a three-plus minute drought for the T-Birds. Three more points from Duckworth a minute later by using a three-point play would bring Cloud County within two at 37-35 before seeing Colby have yet another response by scoring six of the next eight to push their lead back out to six at 43-37.
The fast-paced second half would continue to feature strong shooting on both ends of the floor as Colby would hit three treys in a span of four possessions to take their first double-digit lead of the game with 12:48 left in the contest as part of a 15-3 run that would give the Trojans their largest lead of the game at 58-42. Needing to try and not let the game get away from them, Cloud County would turn to the veteran leadership of Edwards who would hit a much-needed jumper in the paint as the next seven T-Bird points would be scored by the Topeka, Kansas native to cut the 16-point deficit down to 10.
Trailing 59-49 with just under eight minutes remaining, Cloud County would get a made three from
Corey Sawyer Jr. to get back within single digits while eventually cutting the deficit down to five at 59-54 with 7:09 remaining. A timely three from White however would stop the CCCC run as Colby would score the next four points to go back up nine as part of a 7-1 run over the next three and a half minutes of game time to put Cloud County in a 65-55 hole with 3:33 remaining.
Edwards would once again do whatever he could to try and extend his T-Bird career by scoring the next four Cloud County points to cut the deficit to seven as CCCC would get within five by using a pair of Sawyer Jr. free throws with 1:05 left to trail 72-67. The final minute of the game would come down to free throw shooting from both teams as 13 free throws would be shot with Colby attempting nine of the 13 free throws and connecting on eight of the nine as the T-Birds would not have enough offense to answer the Trojans as the final margin of defeat would settle at nine.
After shooting just 32.3 percent (10-of-31) from the field in the first half, Cloud County would be much more efficient in the second half by hitting on 14-of-32 (43.8 percent) of their shots in the final 20 minutes which included five made threes and nine made free throws in the second half. Colby would follow up a 52 percent (13-of-25) shooting performance in the first half with a 44 percent (11-of-25) second-half output that would include a 55.6 percent (five-of-nine) shooting performance from beyond the arc in the final 20 minutes while shooting a total of 36 free throws while outscoring Cloud County 22-15 at the charity stripe.
In their final games as T-Birds, both Duckworth and Edwards would finish in double figures by scoring 21 and 16 points, respectively as four players for Cloud County would finish with at least 10 points. Sawyer Jr. would score 12 of his 14 points in the second half to go along with nine rebounds while Kearney would net 10 points and add five rebounds, three assists, and three steals in a team-high 36 minutes of action. Four of Colby's five starters would reach double-figures as Ronald Mitchell would score a game-high 22 points off the bench for the Trojans.
