ABILENE – ACU senior guard
Eric Lawton closed out his brief but impressive Wildcat career Saturday night with 27 points, but it wasn't enough as the Wildcats ended their 40-year run in the Lone Star Conference with an 83-76 loss to Texas A&M-Kingsville at Moody Coliseum.
The Wildcats – who were eliminated from contention for a spot in the LSC Post-Season Tournament last Saturday – finish 12-14 overall and 6-12 in the LSC. Kingsville, meanwhile, is in the tournament as the No. 5 seed with a 13-12 overall mark and 9-9 LSC record.
ACU hit just 7 of 25 shots in the first half (28.0 percent) and found itself trailing 40-24 at the break and 44-24 early in the second half.
Lawton – who transferred to ACU this year from Arkansas-Little Rock where he played for ACU head coach
Joe Golding when he was an assistant at UALR – took over for ACU in the second half with 22 of his 27 points. He hit 7 of 9 shots from the field, including 4 of 5 from 3-point range while playing all 20 minutes.
He helped ACU whittle the lead down to as few as six points (82-76) on a layup with 24 seconds to play, but that was as close as the Wildcats could get as they closed out the season with another frustrating loss.
Aside from Lawton,
Elliott Lloyd had 18 points for the Wildcats. Lawton, Lloyd,
Dosh Simms,
Steven Werner and
Trevor Wait played their final games for the Wildcats against the Javelinas.
