National News

 November 3, 2009

The Barton Community College men's soccer team took a huge step toward its goal of an NJCAA Tournament appearance with the school's 2nd Region VI in the past 3 seasons. Barton won the championship game 2-1 over Cloud County Sunday at Hummer Park in Topeka. The Cougars moved into the semifinal contest when a pair of ranked teams did battle in the semifinals with the No. 9 Cougars shutting out No. 13 Garden City by a 3-0 score. The Region title is Barton's 3rd in school history. The Cougars will need to win 2 more games this weekend in order to earn the school's 2nd NJCAA Berth. Barton will take on Laramie County (Wyom) Friday at 1 pm in St. Louis in Plains District action. The winner of that contest gets host St. Louis-Meramec Saturday in a 2 pm start with the winner of game advancing to the NJCAA Tournament in New Jersey later this month.

Highlight
The Cougars never trailed the entire weekend but they also spent very little time at ease. In the championship game Sunday against Cloud, Barton took a very brief 2-0 lead that was almost immediately followed by a Cloud goal to make it 2-1 and a Barton player getting a red card, forcing the Cougars play the final 34 minutes with just 10 players.

Barton got on the board 1st Sunday when Leandro Reis scored his 9th goal on the season 15 minutes into the contest. Reis scored on a header from a Tom Shaw free kick. That is how the game went to half. Barton took a 2-0 lead when Harry Newman netted his 18th goal of the season early in the 2nd half. That lead lasted all of 3 minutes before Pedro Miranda cut the Barton margin to 2-1 with 36 minutes to play.

Not long after, Barton's Kevin Ellis was given a yellow card followed by a 2nd card for arguing, sending the sophomore defender to the bench with a red card and forcing Barton to play a man short the final 34 minutes of the game. The Cougars survived some good saves and some shots off the post but Cloud was not able to score in those final 34 minutes as Barton held on for the 2-1 win. Josh Euell had 8 saves during the win.

Barton made it to the finals after winning a much-anticipated battle with Garden City. The teams had won the two previous Region VI titles with Garden winning in a penalty kick shoot-out last year after the two teams battled through 2 overtimes tied at 1-all. This time around Barton scored 2 times in the opening half on its way to the 3-0 win. The Cougars took a 1-0 lead when Larry Mason flicked the ball past a diving keeper on a cross from Ellis just 20 minutes into the contest. Lynton Piertise fed a thru ball to Newman just 10 minutes later and Newman drove it into the bottom corner from 20 yards out.

Barton put the game way with 10 minutes to play in the contest when Reis scored on a free kick from 25 yards out that sailed by the keeper into the top corner. Euell was great in net, saving all 9 Broncbuster shots on goal - the most saves in a game this season by any Cougar.

Barton will take its 18-3 record into St. Louis to play Laramie. The two teams met earlier this year with Barton defeating the Eagles 2-1 in Garden City. That contest took place back in September. Laramie is 10-7 but has won 8 of its last 9 games after starting the season at 2-6. Laramie beat Western Nebraska 1-0 to win Region IX. St. Louis Meramec awaits the winner Saturday at 2 pm. Meramec. Meramec is 16-3-1 after winning its region this past weekend as well with a 2-1 win over Maple Woods.

Stats
Stats can be found at www.bartonccc.edu/sports

Next

Nov 6 - v Laramie County (Wyom) 1 pm (Plains District Tournament at St. Louis)

Nov 7 - Barton/Laramie winner v St. Louis-Meremac 2 pm (Plains District Tournament at St. Louis)