Commerce – Texas A&M-Kingsville had not played a road game in a month and it showed as the 23rd ranked Javelinas fell to the Texas A&M-Commerce Lions 78-63.

   The loss broke a five-game winning streak for the Javelinas and dropped them to 13-2 while the win broke a four-game losing streak for the Lions and improved their record to 7-8.

   Rickey Huckaby led the Javelinas with 18 points, Remi Yusuf added 15, Reggie Love had 13 and Stephen Story had 10.

   Kevin Widemond came off the bench to lead the Lions with 17, hitting 4-of-8 3-poing shots.

   The Javelinas came into the game averaging nearly 92 points per game in their last five games, but couldn’t get things going, especially in the second half.

   The Lions out-scored the Javelinas 47-31 in the second half, shooting nearly 56 percent from the floor in the second half while the Javelinas made just 40 percent of their shots.

   Texas A&M-Commerce turned the ball over only 12 times while the Hogs had 19 turnovers.  The Lions out-scored the Javelinas 30-14 in the paint and their reserves outplayed the Javelina bench, out-scoring them 27-17.

   The Hogs trailed by as many as 12 in the first half, but finished the half on an 18-5 run to grab a 32-31 lead at intermission.

   The Hogs carried that momentum into the first minute of the second half, scoring the first five points of the second half to grab their biggest lead of the game, 37-31.

   But the Lions rallied right back, putting together a 10-1 run to grab a 41-38 lead.

 Texas A&M-Kingsville tied the game three times after that, but Archie Beason’s layup with 14:21 left in the game gave the Lions the lead for good 45-43.

   The Javelinas would cut the lead to one five times, but could never regain it.

   Huckaby hit a pair of free throws with 5:34 left in the game to cut the lead to three, 58-55, but the Lions went on a game-clinching 9-1 run, scoring all nine points on 3-point field goals.

   "If we could have taken the lead, we might have put some doubt in their mind," said Javelina head coach Pete Peterson.  "They played extremely well and kept their confidence up. It was just one of those things.  It just got away from us.  They took a couple of risky three’s in transition with nobody under the basket and they hit those shots.  They played with no fear and took some shots I haven’t seen a lot of teams take and they banged them down."

   The Lions used a number of different defenses to cause the Javelina offense problems.

   "They constantly mixed it up," said Peterson.  "We attacked it pretty well.  They played really hard and they were ready to play.  We are the hunted and we’ve got to get better.  We’re on a plateau right now and we’ve got to rise up."

  The Javelinas return home Wednesday night to take on preseason LSC North Division favorite Tarleton State.