GARDEN CITY, Kan. – A hot shooting start by host Garden City Community College put the Cloud County Community College women's basketball team into holes of 18-14 after one quarter of play and 37-26 at the half as part of an 80-65 road defeat for the T-Birds inside Conestoga Arena in Garden City, Kansas on Saturday, February 3rd.
A second-straight defeat sees Cloud County fall to 12-9 overall and 8-8 in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference while losing their first game to Garden City in their last 16 meetings. The last regular season defeat against the Lady Broncbusters came on January 30, 2016, as GCCC gets back in the win column to improve to 11-10 overall and 6-10 in the KJCCC.
Trailing 7-2 after three minutes of action, CCCC was limited offensively in the opening quarter as sophomore
Josephine Igherighe managed to score each of Cloud County's first 10 points of the game to keep the T-Birds in the contest as Garden City led 13-10 with 1:58 left in the first quarter. An offensive rebound and put back off a missed three for GCCC came as part of a three-point play to push the lead back out to six for the Lady Broncbusters until a pair of made buckets for Cloud County as the two teams combined for nine points in the final 1:25 of the quarter. In the second, both teams traded made shots back-and-forth with CCCC getting within three on two separate occasions before a made Stevi Yanci triple as part of a 7-2 Garden City run that pushed the lead back out to eight at 29-21 with 5:34 left before halftime. Trailing by a score of 29-25 following back-to-back layups, Cloud County saw Garden City close out the first half by scoring eight of the final nine points with a
Sarah Lawless free throw accounting for the only T-Bird point over the final four minutes of the half to trail by double digits for the first time on the afternoon.
Doubling up Garden City 6-3 in the first three minutes of the third quarter, CCCC was able to get back within eight at 40-32 before a 6-2 spurt by the Lady Broncbusters matched GCCC's largest lead of the first half of 12 at 44-32 with 6:06 remaining in the quarter. The lead for Garden City grew to 14 before a
Bailey Burns three-point play that sparked a 5-1 response from the T-Birds to close to within 10 until a 7-0 run by GCCC in the final 48 seconds of the quarter to push the lead out to 17 at 58-41 heading to the fourth.
Igherighe took things over offensively for Cloud County again as the final 10-minute period unfolded with the Minneapolis, Minnesota native scoring each of the first six points of the quarter to bring CCCC back within 11 at 58-47 as the T-Birds still had seven minutes of game time to work with to try and mount a comeback. A 9-2 run by Garden City over the next two minutes quickly flipped momentum however as the Lady Broncbusters took their largest lead of the game at 67-49 at the midway point of the quarter with Cloud County being forced to try and spend valuable time trying to get back within single digits. Putting together a 10-0 run capped off by a
Maimouna Sissoko layup with 2:28 remaining, CCCC managed to get within eight at 69-61 before seeing Garden City respond with five straight points of their own as the lead for the Lady Broncbusters was pushed back out to 13 with 1:37 remaining as the T-Birds never could get back within single-digits the rest of the way.
The highest field goal percentage allowed by CCCC to an opponent this season, Garden City shot 51.8 percent (29-of-56) from the floor and connected on eight of 22 (36.4 percent) of their three-point attempts while shooting no worse than 44 percent from the field in any quarter of the game. The Lady Broncbusters outscored the T-Birds 24-19 in points off turnovers as Cloud County shot 36.9 percent (24-of-65) from the field and just two-of-11 (18.2 percent) from three despite going 15-for-18 (83.3 percent) from the charity stripe.
Recording her eighth game of the year with at least 20 points, Igherighe finished tied for a game-high with 26 points on 10-of-16 shooting and perfect six-of-six from the free throw line while adding eight rebounds and playing all 40 minutes for the T-Birds. Burns joined Igherighe in double-figures by scoring 14 points and adding four assists while Sissoko had a team-high 11 rebounds while being held to just eight points. All six players who appeared in the contest for Garden City scored with Sierra Driessen finishing tied for a game-high with 26 while Yancy scored 20 points to give GCCC to players with at least 20 points.
What's Next?
A difficult two-game stretch for Cloud County will begin at home on Wednesday, February 7th when number 13-ranked Dodge City Community College makes a return trip to Concordia for a 6 PM tip-off. In the previous matchup between squads on December 2nd, Dodge City won by a score of 75-66. The Conquistadors currently hold a 19-3 and are in second place in the KJCCC standings at 13-3 after defeating Pratt 105-89 at home on Saturday afternoon.
