Box Score

San Marcos, Texas – The Texas State men's basketball team won its second Sun Belt Conference game of the season, Saturday, defeating Troy 73-65. With the win, the Bobcats moved into eighth place in the league.

The Bobcats gained firm control of the game, early in the second half. Leading 40-37, the Bobcats went on a 13-2 run to take a 53-39 lead with 13:25 to go. During the run, The Bobcats were led by Phil Hawkins and Emani Gant who scored helped the team pull away. Hawkins started the spurt with a right wing three before cutting to the lane to give the Bobcats a 12-point advantage at the time.

Gant scored four of his second half 16 points during the streak, and finished the night with a career-best 21 points to lead the team. Gant also had five rebounds and four assists. His highlight of the night came in the first minute of the second half when he got an offensive rebound from a missed Joel Wright jumper and flushed it down to bring the crowd to its feet.

Texas State and Troy went back and forth for much of the first half, as there were four ties and nine lead changes in the first 20 minutes. Reid Koenen used his corner shooting to help the Bobcats keep pace. He also had an impressive layup in the second half receiving a feed from Wright who found Koenen making a backdoor cut for two of his nine points.

The Bobcats took the lead into halftime for the third straight game, thanks to an 8-3 run which gave them the lead for good at 34-29. Gant finished the run with four straight points and also had the key offensive rebound which allowed Texas State to hold for the final shot in the first half and take a 36-32 lead into the break.

Texas State will now have a week off before heading to Bowling Green, Ky., to take on Western Kentucky. Game time is set for 7:00 p.m., and can be heard on 89.9 FM KTSW and www.txstatebobcats.com.