CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – The Southeastern Louisiana University men's basketball team got a game-high 22 points from
Roger McFarlane, but a slow second half was too much to overcome in an 80-68 loss to the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islanders Saturday afternoon at the American Bank Center.
Brody Rowbury scored the game's first point, splitting a pair of free throws, but Southeastern (14-15, 9-7 SLC) went cold for the next few minutes as Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (19-10, 12-4 SLC) scored the next seven points to jump out to a 7-1 lead. But
Nick Caldwell got into the paint and scored on a floater for SLU's first made basket. That basket started an 11-4 Lions run, capped by a quick five-point spurt by
Alec Woodard who hit a three, poked the ball away to create a turnover, and then finished the play with a lay-up to give SLU the lead back at 12-11 with 11:20 to go in the first half.
The two teams traded buckets over the next few minutes as a McFarlane three gave SLU its largest lead of the contest at 17-15 with 9:15 to go before the break. But an A&M-Corpus Christi bucket nearly a minute later sent the Islanders on a 14-6 run to reclaim their largest lead of the period at six points as a three-pointer with 3:45 to go before the break made the score 29-23 TAMUCC. SLU scored five-straight as
Roscoe Eastmond converted an old-fashioned three-point play and McFarlane scored on a layup to cut the A&M-Corpus Christi lead down to one point, 29-28, with 2:45 to go before halftime. The two teams then traded 5-0 run until an Eastmond layup with 40 second left made it 34-33. The two teams traded buckets inside the final 20 seconds with Woodard getting a floater to go at the buzzer to cut the deficit down to one point, 36-35, at halftime.
Much like the start of the game, the Lions opened the scoring in the period at the free throw line as Caldwell split a pair at the stripe to tie the score at 36-36. However, just like the first half, TAMUCC scored the next seven to open up an edge before McFarlane and Woodard scored got back-to-back buckets in the paint to cut that back down to three points at 43-40 with 17:10 left. But, after the two teams traded buckets with another Woodard shot in the paint making the score 45-42, the Islanders scored seven-straight points to open the first double-digit lead of the game with 13 minutes left. The Lions tried to keep contact, but A&M-Corpus Christi slowly opened the lead up to as much as 15 points with just less than six minutes left in the game. A Woodard three started an 8-0 Southeastern run as a McFarlane three cut the deficit back down to single digits at 70-63 with less than four minutes to go. However, there would be no comeback as A&M-Corpus Christi scored eight of the next nine points to reopen a 14-point lead at 78-64 with 1:15 to go to close the contest out.
McFarlane led all scorers with 22 points as he hit eight of his 13 shot attempts while also connecting on three of his six shots from above the three-point arc. He also grabbed a game-high eight rebounds and got a steal. Rowbury rebounded from a tough outing on Monday to hit six of his nine shot attempts and finish with 15 points while filling up the box score with five rebounds, three assists, and two steals. Woodard hit six of his ten shot attempts, including two-of-five from three, to score 14 points. He got three steals, had two rebounds, and dished out an assist. Eastmond had eight assists on the evening, going over 500 career assists between his time at both SLU and Denver University, while also moving into second place on the Southeastern single season assists list, now with 190 on the year.
Southeastern shot well in the contest, hitting 48.2% of its shots in the contest, even while hitting 27.3% from three. However, A&M-Corpus Christi shot just a bit better, especially in the second half where the Islanders hit 62.5% from the field, to finish at 55.6% overall while hitting 33.3% from distance.
The Lions, now locked into no worse than the five seed, can still secure a bye in the Southland Conference Championship Tournament by winning its last two games while seeing either Lamar or Nicholls lose both of its remaining contests. Southeastern looks to complete the first part of its obligation to that goal on Monday as SLU heads to San Antonio to try and finish the season sweep of Incarnate Word. Tip-off of Monday's contest against the Cardinals (8-21, 3-13 SLC) is set for 6:30 p.m. at the Alice P. McDermott Convocation Center. Monday's game will be live streamed on ESPN+ while a radio broadcast will be available, thanks to the Southeastern Sports Radio Network, on 90.9 FM The Lion in the Hammond/Ponchatoula area and worldwide on LionSports.net/ListenLive or LionUpRadio.org, or you can listen to the game on smart devices through the Lions Gameday Experience app, the TuneIn Radio app, or the MyTuner Radio app. Live stats will also be available through the host institution.
HARDWOOD CLUB/S CLUB
Fans interested in becoming active supporters of the basketball program are encouraged to join the Hardwood Club. Lion alums are encouraged to join the exclusive S Club, which is restricted to Southeastern athletic letterwinners. All membership fees and donations to Hardwood Club are available for the exclusive use of the Southeastern basketball program. Membership information is available by contacting the Lion Athletics Association at
laa@southeastern.edu or (985) 549-5091 or visiting
www.LionUp.com.
SOCIAL MEDIA
For more information on Southeastern Basketball, follow @LionUpMBB and @DavidKieferSLU on Twitter, like /SLUathletics on Facebook and subscribe to the SLUathletics YouTube channel.
TICKETS
For ticket information, please contact the Southeastern Athletics Ticket Office at (985) 549-5466 or visit
www.LionSports.net/tickets. Southeastern is implementing mobile ticketing as the primary source for securing tickets. All tickets will be available via e-mail in a PDF format for fans to download on their phone or print at home. Tickets can also be downloaded to Apple Wallet.
