STEPHENVILLE – A 16-point halftime deficit proved to be the deciding factor to the end of Angelo State's 16-game winning streak.

No. 11 Tarleton State survived a second-half surge by the No. 4-ranked Rams who cut the halftime discrepancy down to three at 71-68 when Tommy Woolridge hit a layup with eight seconds remaining, but the Texans would hit one of two free throws to take a 72-68 Lone Star Conference win on Wednesday at the Wisdom Gym.

The Rams (21-2, 9-1 LSC) saw their program-record winning streak end at 16, while the Texans (21-2, 8-2 LSC) extended their streak to eight wins and evened the season-series with ASU which earned a 78-60 win over TSU on Jan. 7 at the Junell Center. The Rams have now lost 12 straight games to the Texans in Stephenville, but remain one game ahead of them in this season's LSC standings. ASU, which was limited to a season-low 20 points in the first half, stormed back to score 48 in the second half after hitting 16 of 20 free throws and committing only three turnovers. 

"We are not a team that is going to quit," ASU head coach Chris Beard said. "We didn't play at our best in the first half, but I was proud of our second-half effort. We played well enough to win the game and never gave up. Give Tarleton credit. They did what good teams do by defending their home court and we have to continue doing the same. We have to get back to work tomorrow and be ready for our next game on Friday."

Demario Mayfield recorded his 10th double-double of the season with 12 points and 13 rebounds, while Marsell Holden led the Rams with 20 points after hitting three 3-pointers and going 7 of 7 from the free-throw line. Raijon Kelly added 13 points after shooting 5 of 9 from the field and Chris Jones went for 12 points and three assists. Woolridge scored all six of his points in the second half and Omari Gudul had five points and three rebounds. Holden scored 16 of his 20 points and Jones had 10 of his 12 points in the second half when the Rams shot 20-percentage points higher than in the first half. 

The Rams were down 65-56 with 2:41 to play until back-to-back 3-pointers from Kelly and Mayfield. TSU's EJ Reed was fouled and made one of two free throws. Jones was put on the line and made one of two free throws and on the miss Woolridge fought for the rebound and put it in to cut it to three.

"We really just ran out of time," Beard said. "I would have loved for there to be two to three more minutes. I think we could have pulled this off if there was a little more time. We have an experienced senior group that took ownership of this loss. We came up short tonight, but we'll continue to get better."

ASU finished the game shooting 21 of 57 (36.8 percent), including 5 of 20 on 3-pointers, while the Texans shot 59.1 percent from the field. TSU hit 12 of 20 in the second half. TSU finished the game with a 32-22 scoring advantage in the paint.

Tarleton State jumped out to its 16-point halftime lead after limiting the Rams to 7 of 26 (26.9 percent) from the field, including a 1-for-6 result from the beyond the arc. ASU trailed by as many as 18 points in the first half and never led in the half as the Texans came out on point and shot 14 of 24 (58.3 percent) from the field in the first 20 minutes of play.

Mayfield led the Rams with eight points and four rebounds in the opening half, but was held to 2 of 9 shooting and went 0-for-3 on 3-pointers. Holden and Kelly each had four points with Holden hitting the lone 3-pointer in the half for the Rams. The 3-pointer was turned into a four-point play when Holden hit a free throw to cut TSU's lead to 28-16 with 4:46 remaining in the half. The Rams went 0-for-4 with three turnovers in the final three minutes of the first half and Tarleton made 5 of its last 7 shots in the half to take the 36-20 lead into halftime. Reed led the Texans with 17 points in the first half, while Lee and Hardge each had six points. TSU dominated the paint in the first 20 minutes with a 16-4 points-in-the-paint scoring and it had a 9-2 points off turnovers advantage.

The Rams return to action at 7 p.m. on Friday with a non-conference game against South Dakota School of Mines at the Junell Center. ASU, which is 14-0 at home this season and 25-2 over the past two seasons at the Junell Center, is 12-1 in non-conference play this season.