INDEPENDENCE – Down to just eight available players, the Cloud County Community College women's basketball team would struggle offensively and be unable to keep the pace with Independence Community College in a 78-53 loss in the ICC Field house in Independence on Wednesday.
Losing for the second time this season to the Pirates, the T-Birds fall to 8-10 overall and 7-10 in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference. ICC remains in second place in the KJCCC East Division with the win while improving to 15-5 overall and 13-5 in the KJCCC.
It would be a scoreless opening two-plus minutes to start the game as neither team would have much success on the offensive end to start the game. A bucket from sophomore Le'Yanna McGinnis would give the T-Birds their first and only lead of the game as Independence would then manage to tie things up two minutes later and go on an 11-0 run over the next three minutes of action to force a CCCC timeout with 2:42 left in the first quarter. ICC would then close out the opening 10 minutes of action by scoring the final seven points out of the timeout by the T-Birds to cap off an 18-0 run as Cloud County would trail 18-2 heading to the second quarter.
In the second, Cloud County would begin to have more success on the offensive end but would be unable to keep the Pirate offense at bay as the lead would continue to grow. A 12-point quarter from the T-Bird offense would allow CCCC to limit the damage from Independence, but wind up trailing by a score of 34-14 after hitting just four field goals in the half.
With the deficit still hovering around the 20-point mark, Cloud County would see Independence take a 43-21 lead midway through the opening period of the second half before going on a 7-0 run to get back within 15 at 43-28. The Pirates would have a response, however, going on a 13-3 run in the final three minutes of the third quarter by finding their stroke from beyond the arc to go back up by a score of 56-33 after 30 minutes of action.
In the fourth, a depleted T-Bird squad would be evident as Independence would have the fresher bodies and manage to take their largest lead of the night at 73-37 with just under five minutes remaining. Cloud County would close out the game by scoring 16 of the final 21 points, but never be able to recover from the deficit that had slowly built up throughout the contest.
Shooting just 27.4 percent (17-of-62) from the floor and one-of-nine (11.1 percent) from beyond the arc, the lone bright shooting spot on the night for Cloud County would be the charity stripe as the T-Birds would finish 18-of-23 (78.3 percent) from the free-throw line. The Pirates would hold an impressive 52-35 advantage in rebounds while also getting CCCC to commit 22 turnovers in the contest.
Scoring a game-high 16 points would be sophomore Rori Cox as 14 of her 16 would come in the second half to go along with two assists and two steals. McGinnis would add 12 points and 10 rebounds in just under 27 minutes of playing time while Idalis Lee would score 13 points off the bench. Independence would be led by a team-best 14 from Maddie Curtis as four players for ICC would finish in double figures.
What's next?
Cloud County will look for their first season sweep of the season this Saturday when the T-Birds host Neosho County Community College at 2 p.m. The Panthers fell to Butler on Wednesday night by a score of 100-54 and are now 4-15 overall and 3-14 in the KJCCC.
--cloudtbirds.com--