Even with a scorching start, the UTPB men’s basketball team needed to figure out how to hold on against UT Tyler Thursday.
The Falcons found their shooting touch late in the second half to claim an 89-71 win in Lone Star Conference play at the Falcon Dome.
“We hadn’t got off to great starts, I don’t think,” UTPB coach Kyle Tolin said. “The guys were really ready to play and they played well on the defensive end, made some shots to get going and were able to maintain throughout the whole game.”
Miles Daniels was the protagonist for UTPB, scoring 31 points on 10-of-14 shooting from the field.
UTPB quickly built up to a 21-5 lead in the game’s first six minutes, with Daniels scoring 15 of those points for the Falcons.
A majority of his total came from beyond the arc, as he hit four 3-pointers to give UTPB one of its fastest starts of the season.
That set the Falcons up to take a double-digit advantage into the halftime break.
The Patriots found their response by throwing some different lineup looks at UTPB and they managed to cut the Falcon lead down to four points 12 minutes into the second half.
UTPB regained its shooting touch when it most needed it and closed out the game on a strong note.
Tolin said things got tough for his team when he had to reshuffle his lineup because of foul trouble.
“I felt like we just kept our composure and kept playing right there,” Tolin said. “Obviously made some big shots down the stretch, but got stops down the stretch too.”
UTPB closed out the contest hitting 57% of its shots and going 12-for-26 from the 3-point line.
The victory kept UTPB’s hopes of hosting a Lone Star Conference tournament first -ound game alive.
They’ll need to pick up a victory in their final regular season game and hope to move up the conference standings to avoid having to travel for their first-round matchup.
The Falcons (15-12 overall, 8-7 conference) host Texas A&M-Commerce at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Falcon Dome to end the regular season.
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