ALPINE, Texas - Playing tough until the very last minute, the East Texas Baptist University men's basketball team came down with a 75-70 defeat at the hands of the Sul Ross State University Lobos. The loss puts ETBU at 3-2 overall and 2-1 in conference play.
Only two ETBU players in
Robby Dooley and
Jordan Gosey scored in double-figures with 23 and 15 points respectively. Dooley also led ETBU in rebounds with nine.
Landin Brown and
Nathan Fontenot each had four assists in the game. SRSU was led by Tristen Licon, who piled in 18 points while Caleb Thomasson, who led the Lobos with nine rebounds and seven assists, finished with 17 points. Adding 12 points in the double-digit marks for the Lobos was B.J Hollis.
All game long, ETBU was outperformed by SRSU in field goals (40.6%-35.4%) and three-pointers (37.5%-26.1%). They also gave up 21 assists and 38 points came off the Lobos bench while ETBU had 11 bench points. However, the Tigers out rebounded SRSU 54-37 and made 66.7% from the free throw line while the Lobos made 63.6%.
Brown started the game with a jumper nineteen seconds in. But for the next 5:41, the Lobos would respond with a 13-3 run to lead 13-5. A recurring pattern would occur as whenever the Lobos would have a big lead, ETBU would come back to tie or make the game close. This happened three times as ETBU would answer with a 6-2 run capped off by threes from
Darrice Whitley (13:50) and
Gavin Sabo (13:01). SRSU then extended their lead to 19-13 only to see a 6-0 run on free throws by Brown (9:46), Dooley (9:15), and a tip in by
Alan Wilkinson (8:36) tie the game at 19. After Thomasson (8:08) and Dooley (7:41) traded buckets, the Lobos then raced out to a 9-0 run to lead 30-21 with 3:18 to play. Not to be outdone, ETBU finished the first half with a 8-2 run that included two three-point plays by Gosey (2:32, 1:02) and another layup by Dooley (1:29) made it 32-29 in SRSU's favor at halftime.
After trading two-point buckets to start the second half, ETBU took the lead 36-34 after
Westin Riddick tied it with a three (18:01) and then
Alan Wilkinson tallied his second field goal with a put back dunk at 17:03. Following a pair of free throws by Thomasson (16:53) to tie the game at 36, Riddick answered with a 6-1 run on a three-pointer (16:41) and three free throws (15:37) to lead 42-37. Yet, SRSU would respond with a 9-4 run to tie the game at 46 with 13:44 to play. For the next seven minutes, neither team would build a lead bigger than four points as ETBU started with an 8-4 run (12:46-10:54) to lead 54-50. The Lobos would take the lead back with five straight points in twenty-five seconds only to give up a three to Dooley at 9:08 and ETBU led 57-55. This started a 12-6 run as a free throw by Wilkinson (8:20) plus eight points from Dooley and Gosey combined increased ETBU's lead to 66-61 with 3:46 to play. SRSU would answer with five straight points (3:09-2:51) to tie it at 66 before Dooley's two free throws made it 68-66 at the 2:31 mark. But the Lobos would deliver two big threes by Lincon (1:23) and Hollis (:35) that made it 72-68. Gosey cut the lead down to 72-70 with twenty-seven seconds left, but a three-point play by Conner Dawson six seconds later sealed the 75-70 victory in SRSU's favor.
ETBU returns to action this Friday when they'll travel to San Antonio to take on Trinity at 6:00 PM.
