On Friday afternoon, New Mexico Military Institute opened home conference play with a 78-65 loss against South Plains College. With the setback, the Broncos dip to 0-2 in conference play and 4-10 overall. The Texans improve to 2-0 in conference play with a 12-4 overall record.

H1

After South Plains opened the scoring, David Popa answered right back with a corner three to give NMMI an early 3-2 lead. In the next five minutes, South Plains was able to retake the lead with the help of a couple NMMI turnovers and take a 16-11 lead with 13 minutes left on the clock.

After gaining some momentum with a couple defensive stops, the Broncos used the next two minutes to craft a 6-2 run and knot the game at 18-18 after Ignacio Garcia drilled a three off an assist by Justin Bramao. Taye Williams gave the Broncos their largest lead of the game (21-18) after knocking down one of his two threes made with about 10 minutes remaining in the half.

From that point on, South Plains was able to force a couple of stops and race out to a 10-point 35-25 lead with over four minutes left in the half. Closing out the half on a 9-4 run, the Broncos tried 39-34 after the first 20 minutes of action.

H2

In the second half, South Plains used the first 10 minutes to conduct a 16-point advantage as they opened the half on a 20-9 run and held a 59-43 lead. NMMI was able to answer back a run of their own as they made it a 59-54 ballgame after Joseph Thomas sunk a deep three.

The final 10 minutes of the contest ended in a 20-9 run in favor of the Texans as the game concluded 78-65.

Thomas led all Broncos with 17 points while adding in a pair of steals. David Popa was second with 14 points in 28 minutes of action. As a team the Broncos finished the game shooting 44 percent from the field, forcing 19 turnovers in the process.

Head Coach, Sean Schooley was pleased with the effort, "90 percent of the time we played hard enough to win. We had a couple of lulls in the second half where we looked fatigued," Schooley said. Despite winning the rebound matchup and forcing 19 turnovers, NMMI comeback fell short in part to turnovers. "You're not going to beat anybody with 24 turnovers," Schooley said.

The Broncos return to action on Monday, Jan. 13 at 6:30 pm CST as they take on Frank Phillips College in Broger, TX.