STEPHENVILLE — Tarleton State Men’s Basketball secured the season series against Southern Utah with their second-straight victory in the EECU Center with a 78-74 victory on Thursday night on Greek Night.
The Texans (14-13 overall, 5-9 WAC) knocked off the Thunderbirds (9-18, 5-9) for the second time this year to win the season series, 2-1. The Texans improve to 3-1 in Stephenville all-time against the Thunderbirds. With the victory, the Purple and White are tied for fifth place in the WAC and hold the tiebreaker with Southern Utah.
Tarleton State welcomed their largest regular season crowd in program history with over 3,100 fans in attendance on one of the largest promos of the year, Greek Night. Among highlighting the Texan Greek organizations, all fans were treated to one-dollar beer and hot dogs.
“A bunch of guys got the chance to play and contribute tonight and I thought that was the best part of the night,” said acting head coach Glynn Cyprien. “Texan was tremendous tonight. The crowd was able to lift us and that made a big difference. I want to thank the fans and everyone that showed up and supported us tonight.”
Andy Sigiscar led the Texans in scoring for the third time this season. The redshirt-freshman notched 15, his sixth game in double figures this season. He also posted a game-best three blocks and added five boards. He shot seven-for-nine from the floor, a 77.7 percent rate.
Chris Mpaka notched 14 off the bench and led the Texans with nine rebounds, just missing out on his first double-double of the season. He grabbed seven offensive boards, setting the new record for most offensive boards by a Texan in a WAC game. The senior tied the record previously held by KiAndre Gaddy of six against Utah Tech (Jan. 31), which was also the most this season by a Texan.
In total, four Texans scored in double figures on the night. DJ Dormu added 10 off the bench and Ocypher Owens also recorded 10. Dormu played 31 minutes off the bench and made five of his nine attempts from the floor. He also tallied a pair of steals. The sophomore made his presence felt when he was on the floor recording a +17, meaning the Texans scored 17 more points than the Thunderbirds when Dormu was on the court.
“Coach Cyprien told us, anyone with a jersey on be ready, and that’s what we did,” said Dormu. “A lot of us come off the bench and I feel like there is no let off. I feel like we know the deal, and we know what we need to do to win, and that’s what we did tonight.”
Owens made his seventh-consecutive start and tenth total of the season. He led the Texans with two assists and tied for the team-lead with a pair of swipes. He made two of his three attempts from the floor.
“The energy was amazing tonight,” said Owens. “I credit that to the fans. We had a lot of energy from the crowd tonight and it made it easy for us to come out and do our jobs.”
Southern Utah’s Elijah Duval recorded a game-best 23 points. Center, Isaiah Cottrell, notched a game-high 16 rebounds, the most by a player in a WAC game this season.
The Thunderbirds started the game with their first of 11 made threes to take a 3-0 lead. SUU held the lead for the first 13:46 of the game. They kept up the three-point shooting knocking down three in the first two and a half minutes to jump out to a 13-4 advantage. Southern Utah led by as many as 11, 23-12, with 12 minutes left in the half.
The Texans slowly clawed their way back into the game. Back-to-back buckets from Mpaka shortened their deficit to just seven. Mpaka cut the Texan deficit to five on a monster windmill dunk. SUU brought the lead back to eight over the next several minutes. Trailing 32-24, the Texans took a four-point lead on a 12-0 run. The Purple and White made five-straight shots from the floor during the burst over a three-minute span. Owens accounted for the first four and five of the 12 points. He was followed by back-to-back buckets from Dormu.
Once the Texans took the lead, they never looked back. The Texans took the lead, 33-32, on a Dormu layup with 6:14 remaining in the half, and they never surrendered the lead for the remainder of the game. The Texans used an 8-0 run in the final two minutes of the half to expand their lead to 10, 44-34 with 56 seconds left in the clock. SUU scored the final bucket of the half to send the game into the break with the Texans leading, 44-36.
Cam Thomas scored two of his six total points to start the Texans in the second half. With the Texans leading by eight, back-to-back Southern Utah triples cut their deficit down to just two in the first three minutes of the half. A few minutes later, Kaia Isaac knocked down the lone Texan triple of the night to extend the Texan lead to five, 53-48.
The Texan lead hovered around four for the next few minutes, with both teams swapping baskets. Sigiscar sent the crowd into pandemonium with a pair of monstrous dunks. His first came off a pass from Kade Douglas and he slammed home a two-hand jam. He followed it up a few minutes later with a posterizing dunk over Cottrell off a pass from Owens. An Mpaka layup brought the Texan lead back to 10, 71-61 with just over five minutes to play.
But, the Thunderbirds weren’t done yet. Back-to-back triples yet again brought their deficit down to four. The Texans ran off a 5-0 to bring their lead back to nine with under two minutes to go. SUU cut their deficit back down to three with 24 ticks left, but it never shrunk below that, with the Texans securing a 78-74 victory, their second-straight in their three-game homestand.
The Texans shot 54.1 percent from the floor, improving their record to 46-4 when shooting more than 50 percent from the floor. The Texans made 33 of their 61 shots from the floor and one of six from beyond the arc. Tarleton State had an incredible 60 points in the paint, meaning 30 of their 32 two-point shots came from in the paint. The Purple and White won the turnover battle for the 13th time out of 14 WAC contests this season, 15-10. The Thunderbirds won the battle of the boards, 37-33. SUU shot 38.9 percent from the floor connecting on 21 of their 54 attempts. They let the three-ball fly making 11 of their 21 shots from deep, a 52.4 percent rate.
The Texans will continue three games in a week slate at home on Saturday afternoon against Utah Tech. Tip-off is slated for 4 p.m. from the EECU Center.
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