CANYON, Texas – The West Texas A&M men's basketball team secured a crucial Lone Star Conference victory with an 84-67 defeat of the Angelo State Rams. The Buffs moved to 16-6 overall and 14-2 in LSC play while the Rams slip to 18-5 overall, 14-3 in league action.
 
The Leaders
Damion Thornton led WT with 18 points on 2-of-5 shooting including 2-of-2 from three and 12-of-14 from the free throw line. Julius Brown and Larry Wise reached double figures for the Buffs, scoring 15 and 11 points, respectively. Thornton hauled in a team-high seven rebounds while Brown posted a team-leading three steals.
 
How It Happened
The Buffs set the tone early on defense, forcing the Rams' offense to make mistakes. WT turned the Angelo State mistakes and converted them into three-pointers. The Buffs made their first six three-point attempts before missing their first shot with 10:14 left before halftime. WT continued to convert turnovers into points, building its lead to 18 with two minutes before halftime. At halftime, the Buffs forced 10 Rams' turnovers and turned them into 18 points.
 
After the intermission, Angelo State started the second half on a 10-2 run to bring the WT lead down to eight. The Rams continued to fight back and try to bring the game within striking distance, but the Buffs' offense started to heat up. Before the under-12 media timeout, Brown found an open Thornton for three, stealing the momentum Angelo State had built up.
 
The next four minutes saw both teams exchange buckets with WT holding on to a nine-point lead. In the closing minutes of the game, the Buffs hit their free throws and continued to make shots from the field. WT gained their biggest lead of the day with 56 seconds left in the game as Nicolas Jett swished a three from the corner off an Ahamed Mohammed pass. Angelo State made a free throw left with 14 seconds left, but the Buffs' advantage was too much at the final horn.
 
Inside the Box Score

• WT leads the all-time series 53-26 with a 30-6 record in Canyon.
• Head coach Tom Brown moves to 15-5 against the Falcons.
• WT shot 46.7% (21-of-45) from the field, 54.5% (12-of-22) from deep, 85.7% (30-of-35) from the charity stripe with 29 rebounds, 11 assists, nine steals, two blocks, and 14 turnovers.
• ASU shot 43.8% (21-of-48) from the floor, 33.3% (3-of-9) from the 3-point range, 84.6% (22-of-26) at the free throw line with 26 rebounds, six assists, three blocks, five steals and 17 turnovers.

 
Up Next
WT travels to the Land of Enchantment for a pair of games of Eastern New Mexico and Western New Mexico. The Buffs square off against the Greyhounds on Thursday, Feb. 9 at 8:30 p.m. before traveling to Silver City for a 3 p.m. game against the Mustangs on Saturday, Feb. 11.
 
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