Allen, Texas – March basketball is all about surviving and advancing, Saturday the Lions survived after leading the entire game with a last second defensive stand to advance into Lone Star Conference Championship Game with a 53-51 win over No. 7 ranked and the top seeded team Tarleton State Friday night.
 
The Lions (23-7) will advance to the LSC Championship game for the first time since falling to Central Oklahoma in the final game after the 2007-08 season.  The Lions have not won the LSC Tournament since the 2004-05 when they defeated West Texas A&M in the title tilt.  A&M-Commerce will meet No. 2 seed Angelo State in Saturday's final back in the Allen Event Center at 5 p.m.
 
A&M-Commerce took a 10-point lead, 35-25, into the half and held onto the lead Tarleton State knotted the game at 43 with 7:48 left to play. The two teams traded the lead until Darrell Williams converted a pair of free throws to give the Lions a two-point lead, 50-48, with 3:57 remaining. Christian Macauley hit a huge free throw 30 seconds later to give the Lions a three-point advantage.
 
Tarleton State trimmed the gap to one point, 51-50, on a Malcolm Hamilton bucket, but A&M-Commerce held strong with a defensive stand and another two FTs from Williams pushing the lead out to three, 53-50, with 1:17 showing.
 
The Texans' Mo Lee, who is the team's leading scorer on the season but was limited to just seven points thanks to a defensive effort Anthony Adams and JR Owens, made the final point of the game with a free with 59 seconds to play.
 
The final second slowly ticked away with the Lions missed a fade-a-way jumper, and then surviving Tarleton State last second onslaughts.
 
Owens appeared to end the game with eight seconds left when it looked like he picked off a pass causing a turnover. Owens was ruled out of bounds on the play keeping the ball with the Texans. On the ensuing inbounds, Tarleton could not get off a good shot as Lee hurled up a 30-point three-pointer that came up short giving the Lions the 53-51 win.
 
Five days ago, Tarleton State (27-3) topped the Lions by 20-points, 68-48, in Stephenville for the finale regular season game, but head coach Sam Walker changed the tide with a brilliant defensive play mixing up his defensive looks against the Texans. Walker displayed a man defensive, a complete switching man look, and two different zone defenses to stifle the Texans.
 
Williams led the way with his second consecutive 20-point game in the tournament with 20 points and picked up his 21st double-double of the season with 12 rebounds. Williams finished 5-of-13 from the floor, but went 10-fof-11 from the charity stripe. Carnegie followed with 12 points getting revenge against the Texan defense that shut him out in Stephenville.
 
EJ Reed was the lone Texan in double-figures with 15 points. He was 4-of-10 overall, 1-of-5 from three and 6-of-9 from the free throw line. 
 
The Lions, after shooting 55 percent in the first half, ended the game at 37 percent overall, but ended 6-of-15 from long range for 40 percent. It was the best three-point shooting performance in the last five games for A&M-Commerce.  The Lions made 15 of their 19 free throws attempts for 79 percent.
 
Tarleton State ended at 40 percent overall, 30 percent from behind the arc and 63 percent from the free throw line.
 
Angelo State earned the season sweep over the Lions this season. But the two teams will meet on the neutral court Saturday. 
 
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