The TAMUK basketball team picked up their first home loss of the season last Thursday at the hands of West Texas A&M, but responded with a de- cisive victory over Eastern New Meico
The Buffaloes took the early 13-6 ad- vantage, but the Blue and Gold would answer with their first run of the night, scoring 11 of 13 points. The visitors responded with a 9-1 burst for a 25- 17 advantage and spent the rest of the first half keeping the Javelinas offen- sive attack at bay.
Despite quick buckets from Mouton and Qua Grant, the second half advan- tage belonged to the Buffs. WTAMU led by as much as 19 points, and the Ja- velinas failed to come any closer than
9. Sophomore Creighton Avery turned in his most productive offensive per- formance of the year, racking up 14 points and nailing every attempt from the field and free throw line. Senior teammate John Muton added 11 points of his own and pulled down 9 off the boards.
Saturday’s contest saw the Javeli- nas pick up their 10th conference win of the season and solidify their sole possession of third place in the LSC. In an interview, coach Johnny Estelle attributed his team’s success to strong defensive play.
“Defensively, we did [achieve our goals],” he said.
“We held them below their average. It’s good to see that because I always think if you play good defense, you’re going to have a chance to win no mat- ter what. Our shooting hasn’t been very good. We’ll have to go back and study that, but any time you can hold someone to 50 points in college basket- ball, that’s a good thing.”
The first half of play was a back-and- forth affair. The visitors picked up the first four points, but the Blue and Gold responded swiftly and closed the early gap to three.
Severo scored five of the first half’s final 14 points and his teammates re- sponded with five of their own. The home team held the midpoint’s 29-26 lead.
The visitors picked up a hot streak first in the second period, cutting
their deficit to one. The home team answered with an 11-3 run that brought them out to a 41-33 lead, but the Greyhounds swiped the momen- tum. The visitor’s responded with a 9-2 run that brought them within one.
Five minutes of trading scores saw the Javelinas lead 48-46, but a Grey- hound player and his coach, Tres Segler were called for technical fouls.
Rashon Thomas sunk all four free throws and sunk a three, pushing the Blue and Gold out to a 55-46 lead. The visitors would fail to recover.
Thomas had a career-high night,
racking up 26 points in his 34 minutes. After a slow start Thursday night, the senior returned to the drawing board on Friday to prepare for his team’s victory over the Greyhounds.
Javelina hoops go 1-1 over the weekend“I had a slow start Thursday, and Ifeel like I let my team down. I know I could have produced more in a lot of areas, so I tried to get back to the ba- sics in practice and then implement that into today’s game,” Thomas said.
The Javelinas return to LSC-action Thursday, taking on Midwestern State before battle the Cameron Aggies.
