November 27, 2010
San Antonio – Good things happened for the St. Mary’s Rattlers when they fed the ball inside to Kevin Kotzur on Saturday.
Unfortunately, little else worked so well.
Kotzur had a season-high 29 points to go along with 12 rebounds, but it wasn’t enough as Texas A&M Commerce ran past the Rattlers 84-62 in the finale of the St. Mary’s River City Classic at Bill Greehey Arena.
The Rattlers (4-3) led by six early, but struggled to respond once the Lions got going midway through the first half.
“Our offensive execution just went to pot when we made some substitutions,” Rattlers coach Jim Zeleznak said. “For whatever reason, we could never get it back. They doubled our point guard and got us out of rhythm. We never really could get the right combinations back on the floor.”
St. Mary’s shot just 32.8 percent from the floor (21 for 64), including an ice-cold 10 for 35 in the second half. The Rattlers also committed 17 turnovers.
But all was not lost for them on this night, as Kotzur’s overwhelming performance showed what the Rattlers can do to teams inside. St. Mary’s outrebounded A&M Commerce 40-36, with forwards Brad Hubenak (So., Kennedale, Texas), Ray Marshall (Jr., El Paso, Texas) and Jeremy Fonteneaux (Jr., DeSoto, Texas) combining for 11 rebounds to go along with Kotzur’s dozen.
Josh Orta (So., San Antonio), and D.J. Castro (So., El Paso, Texas) added eight points apiece for the Rattlers, but they just couldn’t find their offensive flow as a whole.
A&M Commerce stormed out to a 42-27 halftime lead and led by as many as 24 points in the game.
With little time to rest, St. Mary’s returns to the court Monday night, when the Rattlers will make the short commute to take on cross-town rival Incarnate Word at 7 p.m.