IOWA CITY, Iowa – In the season opener, the Texas A&M University-Commerce men's basketball team fell 89-67 to the Iowa Hawkeyes on Monday night at Carver-Hawkeye Arena, in a game with eight lead changes.
 
For the first 13 minutes of the game, neither side had a lead bigger than three. With the Lions lead 18-17 at the 9:07 mark of the first half, the Hawkeyes scored the next six and did not trail again in the game.
 
The Hawkeyes outscored the Lions 47-32 in the second half on their way to starting 1-0 on the season, while the Lions fall to 0-1 for the third year in a row, and outshot the Hawkeyes, 46.8 percent to 45.7 percent in the game.
 
Iowa had the 41-36 edge in rebounding, while Payton Sandfort scored 20 points and 11 rebounds to lead the Hawkeyes. This was the first ever meeting between the two teams.
 
Starting his senior season, Khaliq Abdul-Mateen (Cy-Lakes) totaled 12 points and a rebound to lead the team, while Scooter Williams Jr. (Chattanooga, Tenn.) scored 11 along with four rebounds, four assists, two blocks, and two steals. Evan Phelps (Duncanville) added nine points as well.
 
Monday was the Lion debut for Williams Jr., Camerin James (Apopka, Fla.), and Josh Taylor (Norcross, Ga.), who all were in the starting lineup, while Tay Mosher (The Colony), Demarco Bethea (Sellars, S.C.), Chris Adlam (Cypress – Houston Christian), TJ Thomas (Memphis, Tenn.), Yusef Salih (Gainesville, Va.), and Mykol Sanchez-Vega (Orlando, Fla.) came off the bench in their first games as Lions.


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The Lions continue to road trip at South Dakota on Wednesday at 7 p.m.