Hot-shooting Buffaloes tame ThunderWolves

West Texas A&M 71, CSU-Pueblo 59

CANYON, Tex. - An effective Pack effort against West Texas A&M Friday ended up being fruitless as the ThunderWolves saw a night of good shooting and strong defense result in a 71-59 West Texas A&M win.

Despite shooting better than 50 percent from the field and forcing 11 steals, the Pack still trailed the Buffaloes for most of the game.  Much of that disadvantage was dependent on a pivotal first few mintues of the game, when West Texas A&M jumped out to an 11-2 lead while the Pack committed four turnovers and was 1-for-3 from the field.  The small mental lapse was enough to handcuff the ThunderWolves for the remainder of the evening.

The Buffs held the lead throughout the second half, although CSU-Pueblo cut the lead to as few as nine points with just over eight minutes remaining.  But the Buffs hit their final five shots from the field to ice the victory.

For the game, WT shot 56.8 percent from the floor, while CSU-Pueblo made 53.7 percent of their efforts.  Both teams committed 21 turnovers with the Buffs also knocking down 9-of-18 three point efforts.  The Pack was just 4-for-16 from the field.

The ThunderWolves were led by Marc Williams (Jr., Seattle, Wash.), who scored a game-high 15 points while Roman Van Allen (Jr., Los Angeles, Calif.) hit 13 points on five-of-eight shooting.

The ThunderWolves will now face Oklahoma Panhandle State in the consolation game of the Holiday Inn-West Texas A&M Thanksgiving Classic, Saturday afternoon at 4 p.m. CST.  The Aggies lost 66-50 to Division I foe South Dakota earlier Friday afternoon.