ADA, Okla. – The Texas A&M University-Commerce men's basketball team came back from a first half deficit to take a second half lead, but could not pull away, dropping the final game of the fall semester to the East Central University Tigers, 94-84, on Thursday night.
 
The Lions are now 9-2 overall on the season and will break for the holidays until New Year's Eve, when they play at Southern Arkansas.
 
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE
- Malik Albert was the top Lion, scoring 36 points in 26 minutes on 12-of-18 shooting from the field before leaving early with foul trouble. He also had eight rebounds and three steals.
- Trey Seymore scored 11 points as the only other Lion in double figures.
- The Lions were sent to the free throw line 53 times, but were only able to make 32 of their attempts. The teams combined for 82 free throws.
- A&M-Commerce made 4-of-19 three-point attempts (21.1 percent), while ECU made 11-of-27 of their long-distance attempts (40.7 percent).
 
HOW IT HAPPENED
The two sides went back and forth early in the opening minutes and the game was tied at 12-all when Trey Washington took a steal and scored on the fastbreak with 12:17 left in the first half. The Tigers went on a five-point run before a layup by Seymore and a three-point play by Washington tied the game back up at 17-all.
 
With 6:41 to go in the opening half, the Lions trailed by two before the Tigers went on a run as the Lions missed two shots and turned the ball over twice. As A&M-Commerce went cold briefly, the hosts pushed their lead to 10 points at 31-21 with 5:09 left in the half.
 
As the half progressed, the Lions chipped away at that lead, and a steal followed by an Albert dunk in the final minute cut the lead to 35-34. A buzzer-beating shot by ECU gave the hosts a 39-36 lead at the break.
 
Albert had 22 points at the half on 8-of-11 shooting, though the Lions made 12 field goals in the half.
 
After a dunk early in the second half pushed the Tiger lead to five points, four Albert free throws tied the game back up at 44-all with 16:49 to go. As in the first half, a Tiger five-point surge was answered by the Lions, as a pair of Washington free throws and an Albert triple tied the game at 51-all.
 
ECU led 56-52, but the Lions flipped that into an A&M-Commerce lead with a seven-point surge. A three-point play by Dorian Armstrong at the 10:45 mark gave the Lions a 58-56 lead.
 
The game was tied 65-65 at the 8:11 mark, but the Tigers' Ishmael Donzo then scored six straight to grab the lead. A&M-Commerce cut that lead to one point at the 4:14 mark when a Washington free throw made it a 75-74 game. ECU proceeded to score 10 of the game's next 11 points in the span of 1:20 to take the lead to 10 points with just under three minutes to play.
 
The ECU lead went to as many as 11 points before a De'Andre Carson three-pointer at the 1:10 mark cut that advantage to six points at 90-84. The Lions had a chance to narrow their deficit to one possession, but the shot went wayward and ECU held on for the win.
 
HEAD COACH SAM WALKER
On the adversity faced on the road: 
If we can't play in games like this and learn that there is going to be some adversity on the road. When you get right to it, they made 11 threes and we made four. I hate to oversimplify this game, but you have to make some shots. You can't miss 21 free throws and expect to win. That was the difference in the game.
 
On how Malik Albert played:
He had a really good game going. He had 36 points and he did it on 18 shots. He also had eight rebounds and three steals and he did it all in 26 minutes. He played a very efficient game.
 
On how his team played:
I thought we played well tonight. I thought we shared the ball well. I thought we guarded well. It was just a very difficult game to get any type of rhythm. But we shot 53 free throws. Let's put some of those in the hole and win the ball game.
 
On how his group will respond:
I'm very thankful for the group that I have. I'm very thankful for the effort and how we are playing. I wish we had another game to play (before the Christmas break) because we respond so well from not having success.