- LSC Championship Tournament Central
- Complete Game Notes (PDF)
 
THE Championship
The Tarleton State Texans (24-2, 12-2 LSC) will head to Allen for the 2014 Lone Star Conference Championship Tournament, which will be held at Allen Event Center this Wednesday through Saturday, Mar. 5-8. The Texans earned the No. 1 seed and will play No. 8-seeded West Texas A&M (10-16, 2-12 LSC) in the first round this Wednesday at 8:30 p.m.
 
Covering the Game
Tarleton State Basketball will be broadcast live on KSTV (93.1 FM) throughout the tournament. Casey Hogan will have the call with Mike Young joining him for color commentary on mosts of the broadcasts. The games can also be found on-line at www.kstvfm.com.
 
A live video feed will be available as well by logging onto LoneStarConference.org and clicking the "Tournament Central" link. Live stats will be provided from the conference as well, but can be found at both www.TarletonSports.com or
www.LoneStarConference.org.
 
All-time Tournament Information
The Texans will be making its 16th LSC Championship Tournament appearance overall and 13th straight dating back to the 2001-02 season. Tarleton, who won last season's LSC Championship, is 23-13 (.638) all-time since making its first appearance in the tournament back in 1997.
 
The Texans have won three consecutive games in the championship and have tallied a record of 7-2 over the past three seasons. Tarleton has made four straight appearances in the championship final game and nine overall - just two shy of WT's conference-leading mark of 11 appearances.
 
The Texans have two LSC tournament titles, having won the championship back in 2004 and then again last season.
 
The Texans are 4-2 all-time against West Texas A&M in the tournament, which includes three straight wins over the Buffs dating back to the 2009-10 season. Tarleton is 12-3 all-time in the first round of the tournament.
 
Last Time out for the Texans
The Texans erased an 18-point deficit and came all the way back to tie the A&M-Commerce Lions late in the second half, but the home team managed to score the game's final three points over the last 32 seconds to come away with a 79-76 win over Tarleton.
 
All five Texan starters scored in double figures, but the Texan bench had just six points in the game - a season low for the squad.
 
Tarleton shot just 20 percent from the field in the first half and despite shooting 52.9 percent in the second half, A&M-C managed to shoot 41.7 percent from beyond the arc - sinking 10 three-pointers in the game overall and six of them coming in the second half.
 
Scouting the Buffs
West Texas A&M comes into the tournament having lost five straight games, which includes a 94-63 defeat to Eastern New Mexico in Portales, N.M., this past Saturday. The Buffs finished the 2013-14 regular season with an overall record of 10-16 and a 2-12 mark in conference play.
 
WT is in its first season with interim head coach Vinay Patel, who brings in a record of 6-13 after taking over for former legendary coach Rick Cooper in December. Patel won his first game as WT's head coach on Dec. 7, 2013, with an 82-65 victory over Newman.
 
The Buffs are scoring 68.7 points per game, while giving up 70.7 to opposing squads. The Texans averaged 84.0 points per night this season against WT, and following a 24-point win in Canyon and a 13-point win at Wisdom Gym, Tarleton tallied an +18.5 margin of victory over the maroon and white.
 
WT is shooting 45.8 percent from the field and 37.0 percent from beyond the arc this season. Both percentages currently rank third in the LSC. The Buffs' 58.9 percent effort from the free throw line though, ranks last among the men's teams in the conference.
 
The Buffs are averaging 14.3 assists per game - second in the league only to Tarleton's 14.7 assists on the year.
 
Texan Notes
The Texans closed out the 2013-14 regular season with a 1-1 record, downing Lubbock Christian 87-60 in the team's final home game, but then falling 79-76 to A&M-Commerce on the road ... Tarleton finished the regular season with an overall record of 24-2 and claimed its third LSC Championship and second in the past three seasons with a 12-2 record in conference play ... The Texans tied its LSC mark with Midwestern State, but earned the league's No. 1 seed in the upcoming championship tournament via tiebreakers with its season sweep over Angelo State ... The Texans have scored 2,256 points heading into the tournament - just 273 points shy from setting a new school record for most points in a season ... Tarleton has already broke its previous school record of 511 free throws made in a season, entering the week with 563 FT's made ... Chuck Guy currently ranks fifth in school history with 140 FT's made and will need 15 more FT's to become the school's all-time leader in a single season ... Guy has 865 career points heading into this week, needing just 135 more points to become the 16th Texan to pour in 1,000 career points ... Guy's 151 assists currently ranks seventh all-time in a single season ... He will need four more assists to overtake sixth place on the list ... De'Andre Upchurch finished the regular season leading the Texans in scoring with 16.4 points per game ... Upchurch has made 74 three-pointers heading into the tournament ... He also leads the team with an .876 free throw shooting percentage, which is on pace to break the school mark of .875 percent ... Jon Cathey-Macklin pulled down a career-high 16 rebounds on Sunday ... After averaging just 4.0 boards per game over the first 22 games, JCM is averaging 9.8 boards per game over the last four.
 
Texans in the NABC Poll
The Texans moved up to No. 2 last week after earning one first-place vote for a total of 383 total points. Metro State, who received 15 first place votes for 399 total votes, remained No. 1 last week. The newest NABC poll will be released on Tuesday, Mar. 4.
 
The Texans have been ranked inside the NABC Top-25 for 82 different weeks since making its first-ever appearance in the poll back on Dec. 17, 2002. Including this week, Tarleton has been ranked inside the top 10 for 50 different weeks and has been a top five team for 33 weeks.
 
Reisman notches career-win No. 550
Tarleton head coach Lonn Reisman earned his 550th career win lase Wednesday when the Texans downed Angelo State 72-64 in San Angelo. Reisman, who is in his 26th season at Tarleton, is now 552-227 all-time in his career. Reisman became just the 26th coach overall and ninth active NCAA Division II head coach to earn 550 wins. He is the 83rd coach at both the D-1 and D-II levels to achieve the feat.
 
Tarleton back to a Winning Program
With an 83-81 victory over Midwestern State back on Jan. 15, the Tarleton Texan basketball program became a .500 team for just the second time since becoming a senior college back in 1961.
 
The Texans dropped its first ever game as a senior college and then won its first contest on Nov. 28, 1961. That was the last time the Texans had been a .500 team before the monumental victory up in Wichita Falls. A few days after defeating the Mustangs, Tarleton downed Cameron 76-52 in Stephenville to earn its first winning record as a senior college. Heading into Saturday's contest, the Texans are now 730-725 all-time as a senior college.
 
Texans Claim third LSC Title
The Texans clinched a share of the Lone Star Conference title with Midwestern State, giving Tarleton its third LSC Championships in school history and the second in the last three seasons.