The 2014-15 Barclay College Women’s Basketball team traveled to McPherson, KS last Tuesday evening to play NAIA Division II Central Christian College in their season opener. The Bears featured a new head coach in Ryan Kendall in addition to returning six players from last year’s squad, including Midwest Christian College Conference First Teamer Junior RaeLyn Epp (Corn, OK), to lead them into a new season.

Although the Bears knew CCC played a pressing, fast-paced brand of basketball, it sill took them a while to adjust and they found themselves in an early hole. After dealing with the Tiger’s full court pressure and struggling from the free throw line, the Bears found themselves down by 20 points at half-time, 19-39.

With a change in defense and a recharging at half-time, the Bears came back to cut the lead to 8 points a couple times during the second half, but with about 6 minutes to play, the Tigers pulled away and outscored the Bears 41-47 in the second half to get the 60-86 win.

According to Kendall, “This was a good game for us to start the season with. We’ve had really good practices and it was nice to get on someone else’s court and see what we are doing well and what we need to work on.”

Epp led all Bears with 15 points followed by Senior Kaylee Kershner (Great Bend, KS) with 14 and Senior Morgan Stander (Omaha, NE) with 11. Senior Clara Konsky (O’Fallon, MO) led the team in rebounding (14) followed by Junior Shandy Edenborough (Goodwell, OK) with 9.

The Bears next take on an NCCAA Division II Southwest Region foe Dallas Christian next Tuesday, November 11^th at 5:30 PM CST in Haviland, KS.