Thunderbirds halt skid with 79-62 win over Colby

Four players scored in double figures as the Cloud County Community College Thunderbirds snapped a four-game losing skid by knocking off Colby Community College 79-62 in a Jayhawk Conference matchup Saturday afternoon in Bryant Gymnasium.
Joe Kearney led Cloud County with 19 points.
Corey Sawyer went seven of seven from the free throw line in scoring 17 points for the T-Birds.
Justin Graham finished with 15 points, 10 rebounds and six assists.
Cheikh Sow added 11 points.
Picking up their first win since a 59-44 victory over Butler Community College back on December 12, the T-Birds are now 11-7 overall and 7-5 in conference play.
Cloud County is in a tie for fourth place in the conference with Garden City Community College and Barton Community College.
At the midway point in the conference season, Dodge City Community College is in first place at 10-2.
Butler Community College and Coffeyville Community College are tied for second place at 8-4.
“You look at it and we are 7-5. Four top-25 victories, we got ranked for a little bit. Those are all positives for the program,” Cloud County coach Devin Kastrup said. “We look at our five losses and three of them are single digit losses and one of them is an OT (overtime) loss. Count that as a one-possession game. And then the one bad loss to Coffeyville. So I think we are in a good spot. We were 6-1 to start league, and every team kind of goes through something, and I am hoping that was our one period of time. I still don’t think we have peaked. I don’t think we have played our best basketball.”
Colby suffered its 11th straight loss and falls to 4-14 overall and 1-11 in the conference.
After falling behind the Trojans 2-0 early in the game, the T-Birds scored nine straight points to go on top to stay, 9-2.
Colby would climb back to within four points, 17-13.
Baskets by Graham and Kearney gave Cloud County a 21-13 advantage.
Joshua O’Garro, who averages better than 21 points per game, hit a three, and the Trojans trailed 21-16. He scored 16 in the game.
Kearney answered with a three to start an 8-0 spurt that extended Cloud County’s lead to 29-16.
Colby chipped away at the deficit and made it a 35-28 game on a basket by Anthony Sellars with less than a minute to play in the first half.
Two free throws by Graham gave the T-Birds a 37-28 halftime advantage.
“When we allowed them to get it back to single digits that is where our guys on the bench, if we want to go win something, we need them to be better,” Kastrup said. “We need to expand our rotation just a little bit, not a lot, but just a little bit to stay fresh.”
Sellars scored the first two points of the second half, and Colby trailed just 37-30.
Four straight points by Sawyer and a three-point shot by Kearney put Cloud County on top, 44-30.
Colby got as close as 10 points, 46-36 when O’Garro hit from 18 feet with 16:35 to play in the game.
The Trojans would score just three points over the next 6:19.
Graham, Sawyer and Kearney connected on three-point shots during a 13-3 run that gave the T-Birds a 20-point cushion, 59-39.
Colby was unable to make a run over the final 10 minutes of the game.
“We are not where we were at, but closer. I thought we took steps in the right direction in some areas and I thought we were sloppy in others. But as a whole, that's the first time in a long time that we were finally playing with some confidence on offense,” Kastrup said.
Cloud County shot 44 percent (28 of 63) from the field.
The T-Birds were out-rebounded 47-40, but had 17 assists in the game and turned 22 Colby turnovers into 25 points.
Sellars and Mike Bell scored 14 points each for Colby.
The Trojans were 23 of 62 from the floor for 37 percent and just 10 of 22 from the free throw line for 46 percent.
Cloud County opens up the second half of the 24-game conference season with a road trip to Goodland to play Northwest Kansas Technical College on Wednesday night.
Northwest Tech is 7-10 overall and 3-9 in the conference and has lost six straight games.