February 25, 2007
San Antonio – Rashad Pride scored 23 points and the University of Texas of the Permian Basin shot 51.7 percent from the field to upset St. Mary’s University, 79-67, in Heartland Conference men’s basketball action Saturday night at the Falcon Dome.
St. Mary’s had just one lead in the game, 2-0, early on. UTPB turned a three-point edge into a 12-point lead with a 9-0 run midway through the first half. The Rattlers cut the lead to seven at the half at 32-25. The Falcons increased their lead to 12 again in the second half, but again the Rattlers came back and when Marcus Hill (So., Longview) converted on a three-point play with 7:10 left to play to cut the deficit to just five at 56-51. However the Falcons rebounded with a 10-3 run to increase their advantage to 12 at 66-54 with 5:12 left. From there UTPB increased the lead to as much as 16 points.
Jarvis Lee (Sr., Houston) led the Rattlers with 12 points, while Robert Owens (So., Oakwood) had 10 points and seven rebounds. Hill had eight points and eight rebounds.
Pride had 23 points on 9-of-15 shooting from the field and pulled down seven rebounds. Nedrie Simmons added 15 points and Anwar Morgan had 11 points.
UTPB shot 51.7 percent (30-58) from the field in the game, including 65.4 percent (17-26) in the second half. St. Mary’s shot 39.3 percent (24-61) from the field, including 6.7 percent (1-15) from three-point range. The Rattlers outrebounded the Falcons 40-32.
With the loss the Rattlers fell to 15-11 overall. St. Mary’s will advance to this week’s Heartland Conference Tournament where they will be the third seed. They will face the University of the Incarnate Word at 5 p.m. on Friday on the campus of the University of North Texas. The winner will play the winner of the St. Edward’s University-Dallas Baptist University at 7:30 p.m. UTPB improved to 9-17 on the season.