PRATT, Kan. – Season-long trends would hold on Thursday evening inside the Dennis Lesh Sports Arena as the Cloud County Community College men's basketball team would be unable to complete a late comeback to drop a 69-63 decision to Pratt Community College on Thursday, February 3rd.
 
The battle of two teams with .500 records sees Cloud County slip to 11-12 overall and 7-10 in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference with eight games remaining while Pratt improves to 11-10 overall and 6-9 in conference play with nine games yet on their schedule. Just two of CCCC's 11 wins this year have come away from home while Pratt has earned 10 of their 11 victories inside the friendly confines of the Dennis Lesh Sports Arena. 
 
Despite finishing with a higher shooting percentage than the Beavers, CCCC would see PCC score 27 points off 18 Cloud County turnovers to overcome what was a four-of-18 (22.2 percent) shooting performance from beyond the arc and 17-for-25 (68.0 percent) performance at the charity stripe for Pratt. Cloud County would hit on 20-of-49 (40.8 percent) shots from the field and hit just four-of-25 (26.7 percent) of their threes after averaging 55.3 percent from deep in their last two outings. The rebounding battle would finish as a 35-35 deadlock with Pratt also outscoring Cloud County 15-4 in second-chance points.
 
Just two players for the T-Birds managed to reach double-figures as freshman Corey Sawyer Jr. scored a team-high 20 points with a 14-of-15 performance from the free-throw line while Joe Kearney would score eight of his 13 points in the second half. Sawyer Jr. would add seven rebounds while Malang Athian grabbed a game-high nine boards as CCCC would deal with foul trouble throughout the night which limited players such as Justin Graham and Zion Obanla. The Beavers would get a game-high 21 points from Cam Morris as four players would reach double-figures including three of their five starters.
 
What's Next?
Having missed out on a second opportunity to sweep a conference opponent in this year's double-round-robin schedule, the T-Birds will look to complete a season sweep on Saturday, February 5th against the Barton Community College Cougars in a 4 PM matchup. Barton had won four straight in the series prior to Cloud County's sixth all-time win in Great Bend with a 69-66 victory on December 8th, 2021. The last time that Barton made a trip to Concordia came during the 2018-19 season as the T-Birds would drop an 80-75 decision to the Cougars.