COLLEGE BASKETBALL: Slow start proves costly as UTPB falls to Dallas Baptist

Fresh off a down-to-the-wire overtime victory over No. 11 Dallas Baptist the day before, the UTPB men’s basketball team was looking to complete the sweep Saturday against the Patriots. What the Falcons got was a completely different result.

Dallas Baptist got off to a hot start offensively that UTPB could not match as the Falcons fell 91-74 to the Patriots in Lone Star Conference play. Saturday’s game was also the last of a stretch of eight straight games against ranked opponents.

UTPB (8-7 overall, 7-7 Lone Star Conference) saw its two-game winning streak snapped by a Dallas Baptist team that jumped out to a 12-2 lead in the first 4:26 of game action and kept the Falcons in check for most of the first half. The

“I thought Dallas Baptist jumped out right off the bat and established who they were going to be defensively and I think it caught us off guard,” UTPB head coach Josh Newman said. “We just didn’t match their energy and that’s frustrating coming off a big win.”

UTPB’s only basket during that stretch came off a Jay Workman jumper within the first minute of the game.

Dallas Baptist (10-2 Lone Star Conference) got off to a torrid start offensively, making five of its first seven shots, and led by as many as 23 points in the first half before taking a 48-27 advantage into halftime.

The Patriots shot 65.5 percent from the field — including 7 of 9 from beyond the 3-point line — in the first 20 minutes and finished at 58.9 percent for the game. Chandler Jacobs played a key role in the offensive surge for the Patriots, finishing with a game-high 20 points while adding four assists. Carson Hughes and Ricky Lujan each had 16 for the Patriots and the trio —along with Austin Garner —combined for 11 of the Patriots 13 3-pointers.

“We passed the ball better today and got it moving,” Dallas Baptist head coach Blake Flickner said. “(Friday), we got into a lot of one-on-one ball, but today we were playing really unselfish and that’s where those open shots came from.”

The Falcons were able to find some better success offensively in the second half and even outscored the Patriots in the second half. Dallas Baptist’s lead proved to be too much to overcome for UTPB, despite the Falcons closing the game on a 10-3 run.

Jordan Horn finished as the leading scorer for the Falcons with 17 points, while Trevion Lamar finished with 14 points and a team-high seven rebounds. Malik Brikat was the only other UTPB player to finish in double figures scoring with 14 points, making all six shots from the floor.

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