Stephen F. Austin came to Reed Arena feeling fairly good about itself following a promising start to the season. The Lumberjacks left feeling downright overwhelmed by No. 25 Texas A&M.
Elston Turner scored a season-high 17 points to help the 25th-ranked Aggies beat Stephen F. Austin 55-42 on Saturday night. A&M simply overpowered the smaller Lumberjacks, outrebounding them 44-28 and outscoring them 28-14 in the paint.
''A&M has some good big men, and we let them score too much inside,'' Lumberjacks coach Danny Kaspar said. ''We worked on that all week, but they still exploited their size advantage over us.''
Jereal Scott scored 12 points to lead the Lumberjacks (3-3), and Antonio Bostic had 10. SFA shot 29 percent (15 of 52) with no player going better than 50 percent.
''I'm not very happy with the way we played,'' Kaspar said. ''We didn't play to our full potential out there.''
The Lumberjacks at least hung around for a while, as A&M built a 26-15 advantage at halftime with both teams enduring slow starts.
''We're going to make shots at some point, and we're working and shooting more in the gym,'' A&M coach Billy Kennedy said. ''Shooting is not a strength of ours, but in this offense when guys are open, I want them to shoot it.''
Ray Turner had 12 points for the Aggies (6-1) and David Loubeau added 11 points and eight rebounds. A&M, which has not topped 60 points in five straight games, won its fourth straight overall and its 65th straight nonconference home game.
A&M - which came shooting 48 percent from the field, third-best in the Big 12 - was 42 percent (20 for 48). After going 0 for 17 on 3-pointers in a win over Alcorn State on Wednesday, the Aggies were 4 for 12 against SFA - led by Elston Turner's 4-for-7.
''We know in order to beat the better teams as we move on, we're going to have to start making shots,'' Elston Turner said.
A&M had 18 turnovers each in its past two games, but reduced that to 12 against SFA. The Aggies were without their best player, junior guard Khris Middleton, who's expected back in about a week following surgery on his right knee to repair a torn meniscus.
''When we get Khris back it will help our shooting,'' Elston Turner said. ''Because he's a great shooter.''
The Aggies have held an opponent under 45 points in three straight games for the first time in five years, and they have limited the opposition to an average of 16 points in the first half during that stretch.
''We didn't play a great 40 minutes defensively,'' Kennedy said, ''but progress was made.''
Elston Turner was 5 of 11 from the field and Ray Turner made six of his seven shots, including a spectacular slam dunk that lifted A&M to a 30-17 lead nearly 2 minutes into the second half.
The Aggies won their 14th consecutive game against SFA and lead the all-time series 18-3.
The Lumberjacks next host Alabama State on Dec. 10 in the Etech Lumberjack Classic.
