CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi men's basketball team fended off a late retaliation by UTRGV Saturday for a 79-74 victory in the American Bank Center in the first of two meetings in the South Texas Showdown, presented by Rally Credit Union.
The South Texas Showdown, presented by Rally Credit Union, is an annual institutional rivalry between A&M-Corpus Christi and UTRGV where they compete against each other across 12 sports including twice in basketball. The Islanders earned three points towards the competition with the victory today, improving to a 16.0-7.0 lead this year over the Vaqueros.
The Islanders (11-6, 4-1 SLC) controlled the game early and for the majority to hold a comfortable 41-26 lead at the half, but UTRGV (10-6, 2-3 SLC) showed life in the backend to tie things up at 64 with under six minutes to go. However, the Islanders stripped the chance to go ahead away from the Vaqueros as they held down the stretch for a 79-74 edge.
It is the 11
th time this season that A&M-Corpus Christi shot at least 50.0 percent from the field (30-of-60), as they are only team in the country to record that many games reaching that mark. Entering the day, they were one of just three to have 10 games shooting above 50.0 percent alongside St. Thomas and Northern Colorado.
They also took care of the ball, only turning it over five times which ties the program record for fewest turnovers in a game. It was set twice previous, last against Houston on Nov. 25, 2012.
UTRGV's sole lead came at the start of the game after sinking the early three. By 16:40, however, the Islanders had taken that from them for the remainder of the day as redshirt junior
Stephen Giwa took the shot inside to make it a 4-3 game. Freshman
Isaac Williams went coast to coast to push that lead to 13-4 and cap a 13-0 run and freshman
Damarion Dennis created the 11-point lead at 11:41 with the long-range shot.
The steal and score by Williams made it a 22-9 game with 9:05 in the first. Dennis then went deep again at 5:33 for a 30-14 cushion before senior
Jordan Roberts upped it to 39-21 with his own shot beyond the arc. Senior
Garry Clark got the Islanders to 41 before the break as they held the 15-point advantage.
The Vaqueros came out of the break recharged, quickly diminishing the double figure lead the Islanders had built after a 9-0 run made it 43-35 at 16:43. Walker got in for the takeaway, however, and got up for the two-handed slam on the other end to get the Islanders back up by 11 but three consecutive threes for UTRGV all of a sudden had them knocking within one possession at 51-48 to force a home-team timeout with 12:57 to play.
Reconvening after the short break, Walker made a heads-up play and inbounded the ball off the back of a defender before getting up once again for the flush to spark some momentum back into the Islanders and spur a 6-0 run to lead 57-48. UTRGV would flirt back within a possession until finally tying it at 64-all with 5:48 to go but Williams unknotted the score and the Islanders held through to the end.
Williams led the Islanders with 18 points after an 8-for-13 showing from the field. Walker joined in double figures at 12 points as did Clark and Dennis both with 11. Walker and Dennis combined for five of the team's seven made threes.
Clark has scored 10+ points in every game this season. Dating back to last year, he is now on a 24-game streak of scoring in double figures, which is now solely the longest active streak in the NCAA after Treysen Eaglestaff of North Dakota broke a 23-game streak with just eight points on Jan. 9.
Clark also came away with 15 rebounds for the double-double, his third of the year all coming in conference play.
The Islanders have gotten hot for four in a row now and will look to extend their streak Monday night against Northwestern State at 7 p.m. back at the American Bank Center.
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