COMMERCE– The Texas A&M University-Commerce men's basketball team looks to rebound from its first loss of the season as they host Midwestern State University on Saturday in their second Lone Star Conference contest of the season. The game will follow the A&M-Commerce women's game against MSU.
 
WHO: A&M-Commerce (6-1, 0-1 LSC) vs. Midwestern State (6-2, 0-1 LSC)
WHEN: Saturday, December 3 at 4 p.m.
WHERE: The Field House in Commerce, Texas
LIVE STATS: http://stats.statbroadcast.com/broadcast/?id=147041
LIVE VIDEO: https://portal.stretchinternet.com/tamucommerce/
TICKETS: http://lionathletics.com/sports/2016/11/18/2016-17-basketball-ticket-information.aspx
 
The Lions are coming off of an 81-74 overtime loss to Cameron on Thursday afternoon. While the outcome wasn't what head coach Sam Walker wanted, he liked how hard his team played and how they battled through adversity.
 
"We played extremely hard," he said. "They are a good team and we give them a lot of credit. I think Cameron played incredible defense and that really put us in some unique positions that we hadn't been in before."
 
The Lions struggled shooting in the game, especially in the first half. Walker used it as a teaching moment on how his team needs to play when one phase is struggling.
 
"There seemed to be some type of barrier on the rim that wasn't going to let the ball go in," Walker said of his team's first half shooting woes. "We just went through a very cold shooting night. I told the guys at halftime that that is what good teams do. They survive a bad shooting half and they keep the game close. Luckily we were able to keep it close enough to hit a big-time shot to put it into overtime. We just didn't get enough stops during the overtime period."
 
For many players on the team, it was their first taste of Lone Star Conference basketball. Walker liked the ramped up intensity the game was played with.
 
"It was great," he said. "They got a chance to see how it's going to be now night in and night out. This is a phenomenal league—there are phenomenal coaches and phenomenal players. The term we need to use a lot is "respect". We have to respect the game. We have to respect our opponents. We have to respect our scouting report. Games are going to come down to little things—how well you execute, how many offensive rebounds you get, how many turnovers you have."
 
The Lions missed a shot with ten seconds left in the Cameron game that would have given them a one-point lead. Instead, they were forced to foul. After the Cameron player missed his free throw, the Lions had a miscommunication which led to a turnover. They again had to foul and this time Cameron made both free throws. It left A&M-Commerce with five seconds to cross half court and attempt a game-tying shot. Malik Albert took the inbound, ran his defender into a screen, pulled up just beyond half court and drained a 45-foot shot to send the game into overtime. Walker just had a feeling his team would make the play to force overtime.
 
"That's real good coaching when you tell a guy he has to hit a half court shot and they knock it in," Walker joked. "But we had a lot of confidence that we were going to make a shot. I looked at Malik and Jovan (Austin) and I said, 'One of you two is going to make a shot,' and I pointed right where he shot it from. I said, 'It is probably going to happen right as you are crossing midcourt. We are going to crisscross this thing and one of you is going to get a look at it and one of you has got to put the ball in the hole.' I think we have guys that want to take those types of shots."
 
Walker has seen his fair share of game-winning shots in his 25-plus years as a coach at A&M-Commerce. Some of those shots have been in his teams favor, but he has also been on the losing end of them as well.
 
"We had a kid by the name of "Juice" Wooten a few years ago that did that three times in one season," Walker said. "He had three shots of further than 30 or 40 feet to either put it into overtime or to win games. But we've also had a lot of those hit on us. It's never over until it's over."
 
Walker said his team has the same demeanor after the loss to Cameron, but he also doesn't want his team to just handle a loss.
 
"I don't want them to think losing is ok by any stretch," he said. "I don't want them to just accept it and say we will get the next one. That's not the way we operate. We want to win every game where we step on the floor. But I think they are mature enough to know we've got another game to play, another scouting report to put in and another game plan to put together. We need to be prepared to play again. That is the beauty of basketball. You don't get to sulk too much after a loss and you don't get to celebrate too much after wins.
 
The Lions now move on to their game against Midwestern State. Walker praised their talent and the consistency the team has played with for the better part of two decades he has coached against them.
 
"The first game I ever coached here as an assistant was against Midwestern and I was so impressed with their skill set and their speed, their execution," Walker said. "I've been watching it for 25 years. I know I'm going to be mentally prepared. It's my job to get these guys mentally prepared. They are going to be playing a really good team that has had a lot of success in our gymnasium."