- Box Score
COMMERCE – The No. 5 Texans battled Commerce on their home court, but managed to tame the lions behind Fabian Wilson's career night. Tarleton picked up their 13th-straight victory with a 73-69 decision.
Wilson scored 27 points as the Texans improve their record to 16-1 on the year and 8-0 in Lone Star Conference play.
Tarleton got out to a quick 5-3 lead thanks to a couple of buckets by Wes Dipprey and Shedrick Haynes. TAMUC quickly came back though, and took an 8-5 lead by the 18:16 mark.
After tying it up at 8-8, the Texans pulled out to their biggest lead of the first half at 14-10 with 14:38 on the clock. That would spark a Commerce rally though and the Lions turned the four-point deficit into a 20-14 advantage with a 10-0 run.
That put the Texans down six as they reached the halfway point of the first half. The Lions continued to hold the lead over the next six minutes, but Tarleton hung right there with them, never letting Commerce make it higher than a seven-point margin.
Tarleton eventually took back the lead at 28-27 with 1:38 left in the half on a Wilson layup.
The Texans held on for the last minute and a half and went into halftime with a narrow 30-29 advantage.
At the break, Tarleton had shot 34.3 percent from the floor, 20 percent from three-point range and 66.7 percent from the free throw line.
The Texans had out-scored the Lions 18-8 in the paint, but were out-scored off the bench 12-2. The visiting Texans also dominated the boards,
Men's Basketball at A&M-Commerce 1-18-12 Gallery
out-rebounding the Lions 26-14.
Tarleton was by Fabian Wilson, who had 11 points and three rebounds, and Wes Dipprey, who chipped in 10 points and three rebounds. Warren Webb added five boards.
TAMUC shot 37.5 percent in the first half and hit 38.5 percent of their three's. The host team was led in scoring by LaBree Sledge's 10 points.
The second half started with a Texan run as they extended the lead to 42-33 by the first media timeout. Eight of those 12 points were courtesy the inside play of Fabian Wilson. Tarleton also hit six of their first eight attempts over the first five minutes of play.
The Texans continued to push the tempo and increased their lead to 52-38 by the 11:15 mark.
Both teams stalled offensively through the midway point of the second half, but the Lions started their comeback attempt.
Tarleton got the lead to as much as 14 points with under eight minutes of play to go. By that point though, Wilson already had a career-high 21 points and showed no signs of slowing down.
Commerce pulled back within single digits as the score got to 59-50 with 5:44 remaining in the contest.
The Texans rallied behind Wilson though and used his presence in the paint to maintain momentum.
Tarleton ran the clock down with long possessions and limited the chance for Commerce to upset the No. 5 Texans. The Lions did hit some late three pointers and made it close at 73-69 with 6.3 seconds on the clock. Tarleton's defense got complacent and a couple of miscues kept fans in attendance.
Time just ran out for Commerce though.
With a huge second half and clutch shooting down the stretch, Tarleton won their 13th straight game by a final score of 73-69.
Overall, the Texans shot 47.5 percent from the floor, but struggled from deep hitting just 5-of-18 attempts. They did manage to out-score the Lions 44-26 in the paint however.
Wilson had a career-high 27 points on 11-of-16 shooting to go with six rebounds. Dipprey added 12 points and nine boards while Shedrick Haynes added 11 points.
Commerce shot 39 percent from the floor and had four players in double-figures.
Head coach Lonn Reisman talked about the game with a sigh of relief afterwards.
“Any time we can get up 14 points, I'll take it, but we did not capitalize and made mistakes down the stretch,” said Reisman. “They kept pressing and we didn't hit our free throws. This is a very tough place to play and that is a very Commerce basketball team.”
No. 5 Tarleton (16-1, 8-0) returns home to host Commerce for the second part of the series on Saturday at 7 p.m. in Wisdom Gym.
For more information regarding the 2011-12 Tarleton men's basketball campaign, check out TarletonSports.com.
