By Cody Stark
CORPUS CHRISTI — The Texas A&M-Corpus; Christi band was playing the theme song from the movie “Rocky” with a minute left in Saturday night’s game. Too bad for the Islanders, the Bearkats played the role of the underdog boxer who never backed down from a fight.
Sam Houston State overcame a shivering shooting slump in the first half, roaring back from a 15-point deficit to stun A&M-Corpus; Christi 70-58 at the American Bank Center.
Senior guards Corey Allmond and Ashton Mitchell combined to score 31 points as the Bearkats won the battle of the Southland Conference unbeatens to improve to 6-0 in league play and 14-5 overall. Junior forward Gilberto Clavell added 13 points and junior guard Lance Pevehouse scored 11.
“One of our goals for the new year was to handle adversity,” Mitchell said. “Playing on their home court, we knew they were going to make a run. The only run they made came at the start of the game. We handled it pretty well and locked down on defense. Our defense created offense.”
The game looked like it was going to be a wipeout right out of the gate. The Islanders (5-1, 11-9) came out gunning and couldn’t miss, hitting 9 of their first 17 shots.
Senior guard Kevin Palmer scored six of his 14 points in the first seven and half minutes of the game, and Demond Watt added four as A&M-Corpus; Christi stormed out to a 19-4 lead.
Sam Houston’s defense and ball handling, which had been the keys to its five-game winning streak, faltered early. The Bearkats hit only 1 of 11 of their shot attempts up until the 11-minute mark and turned the ball over eight times in the first half.
A&M-Corpus; Christi fans were chanting “scoreboard, scoreboard,” but like all basketball teams, the Kats had a shooters’ chance.
Preston Brown knocked down a 3 with 10:34 to go in the half to cut the lead to 19-7. Sam Houston responded with a 15-3 run.
Pevehouse and Allmond both buried treys. Mitchell got a pair of layups and Clavell finally ended his scoreless drought with an easy basket to tie the contest at 22 all.
Just like that, the fight was on.
“Early in the game we were stagnant on offense, didn’t have much movement and those guys hit some big shots,” Bearkats head coach Bob Marlin said. “They fell into a little bit of a rhythm. We finally hit some shots and got the lid off the basket and played a little bit better defense.
“I thought we outplayed them the last eight minutes of the (first) half.”
Sam Houston closed the half by drilling nine of 14 shot attempts to grab a 30-29 lead at the break.
The second half belonged to the Bearkats.
Sam Houston took control in transition. Junior Josten Crow, who chipped in seven points and eight boards, scored back-to-back baskets off a pair of assists from Mitchell. Allmond followed with another fastbreak layup to give Sam Houston its first double-digit lead at 54-44 with seven minutes left.
The Islanders got to within eight several times down the stretch, but the Bearkats made the crucial plays it takes to notch another road victory.
SHSU shot 47 percent from the field and only had four turnovers in the second half. The Bearkats also came close to their field goal percentage defense goal of 40 percent. A&M-Corpus; Christi shot 43 percent for the game.
“We got out to that lead and our defense got up,” Pevehouse said. “Once that happened we just started pulling away. Our offense came together and everybody stepped it up and made shots.”
The Bearkats return home to battle Texas-San Antonio on Wednesday. Tipoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Johnson Coliseum.
