Eastern New Mexico Men's Basketball | 02.17.16 | David Norton | Photo by Claude Vigil

PORTALES, N.M. — The Eastern New Mexico men's basketball team found themselves trailing by almost thirty points at the half Wednesday against Tarleton State and, despite only losing the second half battle by one point, would find themselves on the losing end of the 83-53 contest.

The Greyhounds (6-18, 2-10 LSC) were led by Lawrence Domingo who scored 12 points and grabbed a team high nine rebounds.  The Texans (18-7, 7-5 LSC) were led by EJ Reed with 16.

Greyhound head coach Stott Carter said, "Tarleton is going to make you go hard, coming off all those screens and running all those sets.  I think it took us awhile to respond to that, but in the second half our guys came out and played much better and I'm proud of them for that."

The first half deficit can be attributed to ENMU's shooting, where they struggled to connect and went 6-30 from the field.  The Texans on the other hand, shot 47 percent from the floor and hit 64 percent of their 3-point shots.  For the game ENMU shot 29 percent while the Texans hit 47 percent of their shots.

The Hounds did very well on both the offensive and defensive glass, snagging 21 and 22 rebounds, respectively, for 43 total boards.  Tarleton recorded 41 rebounds.

Eastern shot much better in the second half, hitting almost 40 percent of their field goals; a stark contrast to the first.  Not only did the Hounds play better offensively, but they were much more aggressive on defense as well.

 "The second half I was very happy with our effort overall.  Now all we can do is look forward from here and get ready for Commerce, a team we beat here.  They play very well at home so it will be a tough challenge and we just have to be prepared for a good game."

Don't forget to check out the post game interview with assistant coach Matthew Wilson, located under the story links section of this article or by clicking HERE.  ENMU will head to Commerce, Texas, for their matchup with Texas A&M-Commerce on Saturday, Feb. 20.  Tipoff is slated for 5 p.m. (MT).