MARSHALL, Texas – Controlling the game from the beginning, the East Texas Baptist University men's basketball team pulled away in the second half taking an 83-70 win over Concordia University-Texas on Saturday. ETBU is now 18-5 overall and 11-3 in the American Southwest Conference East Division.
 
Four Tigers reached double-figures as Nathan Fontenot came off the bench to score a team-high 17 points on six-of-10 shooting. Robby Dooley poured in 15 points missing only one shot from the field on seven attempts while both Jordan Gray (six rebounds) and Christopher Haynes (four blocks) tallied 13 points apiece. Landin Brown would be effective on offense with nine assists and on defense with three steals. CTX did have four double-digit scorers as well with Luis Gonzalez leading with 22 points. Philip Meikle tallied 14 points while both Jordan Berry and Trevon Hester recorded 10 points apiece.
 
Making a little over half their field goals (50.8%), ETBU would managed to shoot 32.1% from the three-point range while holding CTX to 25% from downtown. Outrebounding CTX, 38-35, ETBU benefitted from a 38-32 edge in points in the paint while their bench outscored the Tornadoes, 35-29. Defensively, ETBU blocked six shots while CTX won the steals category, 9-7.
 
CTX would have one lead all game long as they scored the first point of the game on a free throw (19:10) to go up, 1-0. Dooley's layup at 18:23 would give ETBU a 2-1 lead that would never be retaken. This led to five straight points (17:54-17:22) to lead, 7-1. Down 12-5 (14:15), the Tornadoes would cut the lead to one, 14-13 (13:37-11:09), only to see ETBU pick up a 10-2 rally (10:54-8:51) with five points from Gray (9:56, 8:51) to trail, 24-16. Facing a 28-19 deficit (5:57), CTX would come within one again, 28-27, but were unable to knot the score as ETBU would swing momentum their way with three's by Jaden Conner (2:22) and Gray (1:52). In the closing seconds, Brown would knock down a three-pointer at the buzzer to give ETBU a 39-31 at halftime.
 
While CTX would come within three, 41-38 (17:02), to start the second half, Dooley (16:25, 16:02) and Fontenot (14:51, 14:21) would respond with nine points to push their lead to 10, 50-40. CTX brought the score to within nine points (56-47) at the halfway point. Ahmad Caldwell's layup at with 9:30 left in the game put ETBU up 58-47. That double-digit lead stuck throughout the rest of the half. ETBU would score 22 points in the next four minutes to grow their lead to as high as 20 points with 4:50 left to play (80-60). In the end, a 10-3 Tornado run made the final score 83-70.
 
ETBU will host Belhaven University at 7:30 PM in Ornelas Gymnasium next Thursday night.