Barton Volleyball holds off Conquistador upset bid in five set thriller #GoBarton

Hitting the court for the first time in two weeks due to opponents needing to postpone, the Barton Community College volleyball team held off a pesky Dodge City Community College squad in a five set thriller Monday night at the Barton Gym.

Barton took a 2-0 match lead with 25-19 and 25-21 scores but then the wheels fell off with Dodge City winning 25-23 and 25-21 to force the fifth set. Trailing 8-7 in the final frame, Barton rolled in front with a four point spurt, held off the Conquistadors from tying it up, before putting the final dagger in the match with three straight for a 15-11 win.

The victory was the eighth straight over the Conquistadors and the 19th win in the last twenty meetings, improve the overall series to 74 wins against just five losses.

Just outside the top twenty for the second straight week, the Cougars improve to 3-0 in conference play and 11-2 overall while Dodge City slides to 2-4 in league and 2-8 on the year. Barton will have its stiffest test of the year on Wednesday in traveling to conference unbeaten No. 6 ranked Seward County Community College in a 6:30 p.m. first serve at The Greenhouse.

Barton matched its previous high of attacks with 60 despite hitting below their average in finishing at a .266 percentage. The Cougars pounded out fifteen kills on a .406 attack in the opening set before cooling down including just a .107 in the fourth helping to send it to five sets. In the final frame the Cougars played like the first set, committing just two attack errors for a match high .474 and eleven kills of the fifteen point total.

Mylena Testoni led with her second double-double of the year, committing just one error on twenty-five swings for a .680 clip with 18 kills and 15 digs. Tasiah Nunnery, who changed positions to middle attacker in lieu of Carol Melo nursing an injury, put down 13 kills on a .385 attack. Joelle LaForce put down 12 kills with a team leading three blocks. Isabella Guedes and Alyssa Herter had 32 and 22 assists respectively in the 6-2 offense with Hanna Miller and Jadyn Brown joining Testoni with double digit digs with 15 and 10 each.

Recap
Dodge City strung six straight to open an 11-7 opening set lead before LaForce's attack led a Cougar 4-0 spurt to tie it up. The Conquistadors took their final lead at 14-13 but Testoni's pair of kills led another Barton four straight to gain the lead. Another string of four straight opened up a six point 23-17 lead as the teams traded points the rest of the way.

Barton again found themselves trailing early in the second, erasing a 9-3 deficit with a six-pack of points with Brown leading the charge with two of her four kills in the set. Tied for the final time at 19, Nunnery keyed a difference making four straight leading to the eventual four point win.

In the closest set of the night, the two teams battled point for point with three points being the largest lead for either team. A pair of Barton errors were the final difference maker in forcing a game four for the first time since 2017 in the series.

As the momentum shifted to Dodge City and Barton went flat and continued to struggle without their starting middle hitter, the Conquistadors jumped all over the Cougars with seven straight and nine of the first ten points. Three consecutive kills by Testoni and a block by Addison Crites and LaForce helped close the gap to four but Dodge City roared back with four of their own to lead at 15-8. The lead grew to eight before Barton made another charge winning 5-of-6 points behind three of Testoni's six kills of the frame closing to 20-16. Dodge City pushed the gap back out to four twice to gain set point as Barton's final three points were too little too late to make a serious comeback.

Getting to five sets for the first time since Dodge City's last win against Barton in 2016 of a 21-19 fifth set thriller, Monday's final set went point for point through the first half with the Conquistadors on the top end of an 8-7 score. The Cougars then began to get hot, hitting for a .474 attack while defensively put the clamps on Dodge City. LaForce's kill tied it up, and following a Dodge City attack error putting Barton ahead for good, consecutive Nunnery attacks opened up a short lived three point gap. A Barton service error and Conquistador attack was interrupted by a Maria Santos kill but another Cougar service error made it a one point 12-11 Cougar lead. Two straight thunderous Testoni kills gained match point, and following a Dodge City timeout, Santos and Brown hosted a block party to hold off any late Conquistador charge.