Abram Choate, SID

BROWNWOOD, Texas – The Yellow Jackets held the Mountaineers of Schreiner University to just 29.2% shooting and clinched the ASC West Division Title on Saturday in the Brownwood Coliseum.

Both teams did not shoot the ball well early, but the Yellow Jackets slowly built a 19-9 lead with 9:33 left in the half. HPU extended their lead to 16 and went into the locker room up 37-21.

In the second half Schreiner rallied back to within 10 at the 14 minute mark. Over the next five minutes HPU pushed their lead back to 15, 57-42 with nine minutes left to play. The Yellow Jacket secured the win, 80-62. Keys to the game were HPU holding Schreiner to 29.2% shooting for the game and out-rebounding the Mountaineers 50-40.

Sean Wheeler(San Angelo, TX),   had a game high 17 points with nine boards for HPU. Cliff McGuire(Haskell, TX) and Matt Zinser(Burnet, TX) in their final regular season game as Jackets, score 13 and 9 respectively. Zinser also had a game high 11 rebounds. Josh Weatherred(Amarillo, TX) scored 11 off the bench for HPU.

Schreiner was lead by Kevin Deans and Lance Hrncir, both with 16 points.

The Yellow Jackets with the win and a loss by McMurry University to Mary Hardin-Baylor, clinched the ASC West Division Title and will host the 2006 ASC Men's Basketball Tournament next weekend February 24-26. Howard Payne will play their first round game against University of Texas-Dallas at 7:30 pm on Friday, February 24, in the Brownwood Coliseum.