Coming off a long weekend of travel, the No. 10 ranked Barton Community College volleyball team continued its road-heavy stretch Tuesday night, opening conference play with a sweep at Seward County Community College (25-13, 25-15, 25-23).
The victory improves Barton to 9-3 on the season while Seward County drops to 0-2 in league play and 6-8 overall. The Cougars face a quick turnaround, returning home from Liberal before making another three-hour drive Wednesday for a 6:30 p.m. first serve at No. 16 Colby Community College (2-0, 7-3) in an early-season battle for the conference driver's seat.
Barton jumped on the Saints early with a five-point spurt, adding another four-point run in building a 15-5 advantage. The Cougars kept Seward County from stringing multiple points together until late in the set, methodically pulling away despite committing five service errors in the frame.
The Saints regrouped in the second, rattling off four straight points in taking a 6-2 lead. Barton answered with a pair of three-point spurts to move in front 8-7. Leading 11-10, the Cougars began putting the Saints in the taillights with three straight points before adding four more on the other side of a Seward County timeout to blow open the set, eventually putting it away with a 5-1 closeout.
A trio of Barton points for a 16-10 lead in the third appeared to provide the final dagger, but Seward County hung around, steadily chipping away before climbing within 22-21. Following a Barton timeout, kills by Amanda Riepe and Brylynn Wicker thwarted the Saints' comeback bid before the Cougars closed out their fourth consecutive KJCCC-opening sweep.
Kiera Loe powered the Barton attack with a season-high 19 kills on .459 hitting, committing just two errors across 37 swings while adding nine digs, three block assists and two service aces. The sophomore transfer accounted for nearly half of Barton's 39 kills while producing a match-high 22.5 points.
Wicker put down six kills without an error on 12 swings for a .500 attack as Barton hit .344 for the match, committing just six attack errors in 96 swings. After producing just seven kills in the opening set, the Cougars knocked down 32 over the final two frames, including 17 on .441 hitting in the second. Neal and Malinowska-Nowak distributed 21 and 12 assists, respectively, while Tarui anchored the back row with 13 digs and Katsis added 11.