Box Score

ODESSA (February 1, 2013): Courtesy LMT - Closing in on their biggest victory of the season, the Texas A&M International women’s basketball team couldn’t hold on.
 
UTPB guard Teisha King tied the game on a jumper with one second left and the Falcons outscored TAMIU 12-1 in overtime to grab a 79-68 victory in Odessa. UTPB has now won eight straight games and remains tied for first place in the Heartland Conference.
 
“We weathered the storm throughout the entire second half and it came down to one defensive possession and we just didn’t do a good job on King,” Head coach Michelle Bento-Jackson said. “She single-handedly took over the game. We had our opportunity to win the game and we came up short.”
 
TAMIU led by two points with the ball on two separate occasions with time running short but Tina Dang got called for an offensive pushoff with 38 seconds remaining and Amanda Mangan lost possession with 28 seconds remaining, resulting in a game-tying layup three seconds later. Samantha Chacon put the Dustdevils back up two with six seconds left before King’s game-tying shot.
 
“We were in control of the clock and all we had to do was get the ball in bounds and they were going to foul us,” said Bento-Jackson, referencing Dang’s pushoff. “It’s about understanding the situation that we talk about in timeouts. Just get the ball in bounds and make a head’s up play.”
 
With the loss, TAMIU drops to 7-13 on the season with a 3-5 record in conference play. While they remain in fourth place in the Heartland Conference, Arkansas-Fort Smith (6-13, 2-4) is right behind them and has fewer losses.
 
Averaging 18.3 points per game in the past six contests and coming off of a career-high 27 Thursday, senior guard Amanda Mangan was held to just four points on 2-of-7 shooting. Meanwhile, King scored 30 points for the Falcons with six assists to carry them to the win.
 
Chacon led the team in points (14), rebounds (6) and steals (4) on the day while Dang also scored 14. Center Malika Jackson had nine points and tied for the high with Chacon with six rebounds.
 
The Dustdevils led by as many as 14 in the first half and nine at halftime despite getting just two points from Mangan and turning the ball over 12 times. The Falcons closed the gap in the after the break, tying the game a few minutes into the second half.
 
“We took a lead in the first half but I didn’t think we played really smart. We had a lot of careless turnovers and we had opportunities to extend our lead and didn’t do that,” Bento-Jackson said. “We came out in the second half and gave them hope.”
 
TAMIU now returns home to play Newman (6-13, 1-5) on Thursday at 5:30 p.m. before a huge showdown Saturday at 2 p.m. against Arkansas-Fort Smith in a battle for fourth place.