LAWTON, Okla. – Sophomore C.J. Smith (Mansfield, Texas) went off for 20 points and the Texas A&M-Kingsville men's basketball team concluded its 2021-22 regular season by dominating the Cameron Aggies, 87-62, on Saturday afternoon in Lone Star Conference action at Aggie Gym in Lawton, Okla.
The Javelinas finish the regular season at 15-9, their third straight year with at least 15 victories, and they're 6-7 in conference. The Aggies end the year 5-18 and 3-13.
"I believe our guys were very focused tonight," said coach Johnny Estelle. "They were not happy with the outcome on Thursday and wanted to get back to winning. This was our fourth win out of the last five games and I believe we are getting better by the day.
"Coach Gonzalez and coach Thomas did a great job preparing us with a good details in the scouting report, which allowed us to play good defense."
For Smith, this marks five times he's scored 20 points in 2021-22 and in this instance, he did it on 7-of-10 shooting and was 6-of-8 from beyond the arc. Junior Creighton Avery (Corpus Christi, Texas) and sophomore Jake Majors (Corpus Christi, Texas) each pitched in with 10 points while combining for nine assists. TAMUK's leading rebounder was freshman Ja Robertson (Houston, Texas) who pulled down eight boards while adding the first two points of his Javelina career.
"C.J. Smith played extremely well in the first half and shot the ball extremely well. Creighton Avery did an outstanding job in every phase of the game and I was very proud of Ja Robertson, who had eight rebounds and a blocked shot in 17 minutes of action."
The Javelinas never trailed in this contest, starting the game by jumping to a 7-2 lead that included Smith's first triple of the game. Cameron closed to within 10-8, but then the Javs took off their first run of the day.
A layup by Avery started a stretch of 14 straight points for the Hogs that included two more buckets from the Corpus Christi native and a pair of Smith treys. When the run was over, the Javelina lead had been stretched to 24-8. The Hogs used an 8-2 burst later in the period to increase their lead to 18 and the ninth three-pointer of the half for the Blue and Gold came from junior Sammy Brooks (Dallas, Texas) right before the buzzer and put TAMUK up 43-27 at the break.
The second half started with scores by both sides, but after CU used back-to-back baskets to close to within 12, the Javs rattled off nine of the game's next 10 points to go up by 20 for the first time at 55-35. After that, the Aggies never got closer than 17 and the Javelinas cruised to their 15th win of the year.
All 11 Javelinas who got on the court contributed to the scoring and TAMUK's 53.8 shooting percentage, their second-best of the season, included a 60 percent clip in the second half. The Hogs were also 14-of-28 on threes and outrebounded their hosts, 40-26.
"I'm extremely proud of our guys," said Estelle, "because they have been through a lot this year. This team is still working to get better every day while demonstrating Javelina pride every step of the way."
The Javelinas will now set course for the Lone Star Conference Tournament and for them, that will start in Commerce, Texas, where they'll match up with the Texas A&M-Commerce Lions on Tuesday. Fans can keep up with Javelina men's basketball throughout the season by following @JavelinaMBB on Twitter and Instagram, liking Texas A&M University-Kingsville Men's Basketball on Facebook, subscribing to the Javelina Athletics YouTube channel and visiting Javelinaathletics.com.
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