Box score

EDINBURG, TX—Texas-Pan American senior Jared Maree scored eight points in a crucial late-game 92-second stretch, including the go-ahead 3-pointer and then the Broncs made 12 free throws in the final 1:28 for a hard-fought 75-67 Great West Conference men's basketball win over visiting NJIT Thursday night.
 
The Broncs, who have won three in a row and five of their last seven, solidified their grip on second place in the Great West, moving to 4-2 in conference play with the win. They are 10-17 overall. NJIT, last year's second-place finisher, drops to 4-4 in the Great West and 11-14 overall.
 
Maree, a 6-foot-3 wing who came in as his team's leading scorer, averaging 13.3 points per game, was relatively quiet through the first 34:40, collecting six points until what proved to be a game-changing run that began on a 3-pointer with 5:25 remaining.
 
That three, which came on the heels of NJIT turning the ball over on four straight possessions, put Texas-Pan American ahead to stay, 51-49.
 
After another NJIT turnover, this one on a charging call, Josh Cleveland went to the foul line the 13th foul of the half and 25th of the game whistled against the Highlanders.
 
Cleveland made the second of two free throws, giving UTPA a 52-49 edge with 4:54 left. On the other end, NJIT got back two points when Lamar Kearse converted a pair of free throws to trim the deficit back to one point.
 
Maree answered with a traditional 3-point play 11 seconds later for a four-point lead. PJ Miller attacked the basket for the Highlanders on the next possession and was fouled on his drive, earning two free throws. He made the first for a 5-for-5 start at the line, but missed the second, setting the Bronc lead at three with 4:15 on the clock.
 
Maree thrust in the dagger 27 seconds later, hitting another three to push his team's lead to six, its biggest of the night to that point at 58-52.
 
NJIT coach Jim Engles called timeout almost immediately, with 3:46 remaining, but it was too late, as UTPA closed out the win by scoring 15 points in the final two minutes. Three of them came on a downtown shot by Ruben Cabrera, a burly 6-7, 245-pound forward who had been 13-for-41 from distance on the season, and then the last 12 came on free throws, where the Broncs were 12-for-14 over the closing 1:38.
 
The last seven made free throws came from junior Brandon Provost, who shot 10-for-12 at the line and finished with a team-leading 15 points. He came in as an 81 percent foul shooter on the year and was averaging 13.2 points, just behind Maree for the team lead.
 
After Maree's 14 points, Texas-Pan American got 13 points off the bench from Cleveland. A high-jumping 6-foot-6 post player, Cleveland also got 13 points against NJIT when the Broncs sustained a 58-57 loss in Newark on January 21. In Thursday's rematch his first three baskets were dunks out of the half-court offense on dropoff passes from his teammates. He also had a big second-half dunk on a put-back basket, slipping through a failed NJIT box-out attempt to slam home a Maree miss and tie the score at 47 with 6:39 left, helping to set the stage for the Maree-led winning spurt a couple of minutes later.
 
The Highlanders, who are 1-3 in Great West road games with one left on the schedule, had three double-figure scorers, as well. Isaiah Wilkerson, who played just 29 minutes due to foul trouble, was the game leader in points (16) and rebounds (9), while Lamar Kearse added 13 points and Ryan Woods 12 for NJIT. Kearse has three straight games with at least 12 points as the first sub at guard.
 
Fouls and turnovers were deadly to the Highlanders, who committed 20 turnovers, including 13 in the second half, with five crucial ones in the span of 3:17 that helped transform NJIT's next-to-last lead (49-47 with 8:42 left) into a 52-49 deficit 2:48 later.
 
Fouls and foul trouble may have been the biggest issue for NJIT, both on the scoreboard and in the way Engles could utilize his personnel.
 
The final box score showed 34 fouls against the Highlanders to 22 against Texas-Pan American. And even discounting the six fouls for the Highlanders in the last 1:38 after they went down nine points on Cabrera's triple, they were whistled 16 times before then in the second half and 28 times in the first 36:27 when the Bronc lead was never bigger than six.
 
The final foul shooting totals showed Texas-Pan American at 33-for-45 to 14-for-17 for NJIT, a 19-point advantage for the home team, which got 28 more attempts.
 
With score tied at the half, 33-33, UTPA was 11-for-16 on free throws, thanks to 13 NJIT fouls, while the Highlanders were 2-for-2 on eight Texas-Pan Am fouls.
 
The 34 personal fouls led to foul trouble in both halves, as Wilkerson and Woods both fouled out, three others had four fouls, and still four more had three fouls apiece. As a result, Engles was forced to mix-and-match on the fly and no Highlander played more than Wilkerson's 29 minutes.
 
In the first half, two starters were forced to the bench early. Chris Flores got his second foul at the 13:03 mark, 24 seconds after assisting on a Kearse three that gave NJIT at 16-10 lead.
 
He gave way to PJ Miller, a starter who had been resting. Miller soon hit the bench himself after his second foul at 11:29, 37 seconds after assisting a Sammy Schickel triple that put the Highlanders up, 19-14.
 
Even with the foul trouble, the Highlanders got good production from those who stayed on the floor and NJIT led the entire half until lafter the halftime buzzer. After taking their biggest lead, 28-21, at the 5:49 mark on Shickel's second three of the night, NJIT missed four straight shots, including two layups and UTPA whittled its way closer.
 
Kearse, who led his team at halftime with eight points, hit the seventh Highlander 3-pointer of the first half for a 31-25 advantage with 2:56, but Provost made his team's second three of the night 11 seconds later.
 
Maree made the first of two free throws, trimming the NJIT lead to two, 31-29, with 1:47 left in the half, before Kherel Silcott hit his team's only two free throws of the opening period for a 33-29 Highlander advantage with 90 ticks left.
 
Cleveland, whose nine points would lead all scorers at the half, made a short jump shot at the other end before an NJIT turnover, followed by two missed foul shots for UTPA. 
 
The Highlanders appeared set to go into the locker room with at least a two-point edge. However, after a timeout, they got a missed baseline jump shot by Wilkerson just ahead of the buzzer. The ball came off to Earl Jefferson of the Broncs and Silcott was called for a foul on the rebound and Jefferson made both foul shots with no time on the clock, sending the teams to the locker room tied at 33.
 
Neither team scored in the second half until a Silcott dunk 1:30 in and then a Wilkerson layup that put NJIT on top by four, 37-33, with 17:36 left.
 
Maree finally broke the ice for the Broncs with 16:31 remaining in the game, but they would not get another field goal until Nick Weiermiller made his only basket of the game, a 3-pointer at the 10:52 mark.
 
UTPA managed only four points on free throws in the 5:39 between field goals, but NJIT could not match its defensive prowess with enough success on the offensive end, getting just six points of its own while the Broncs were scoring four at the foul line.
 
As a result, the Highlanders' 41-35 lead after a Wilkerson layup at the 13:57 mark was their biggest advantage of the second half.
 
That six-point lead soon went down to two, as the Highlanders committed their sixth and seventh fouls of the second half and Texas-Pan American, which was in the bonus for the last 13:07 and the double-bonus for the last 8:55, made four free throws on the sixth and seventh NJIT fouls.
 
Miller hit two free throws to push the NJIT lead back to four, 43-39, at the 11:31 mark, but then Weiermiller hit his three and Jefferson sunk two free throws to give UTPA its first lead of the night, 44-43, at the exact midpoint of the final half.
 
With both teams' scoring coming at the foul line, Miller put NJIT back on top by one 17 seconds after Jefferson had taken the lead for UTPA.
 
After a Bronc turnover, NJIT missed a layup and then Cabrera re-tied the score by making the second of two free throws with 8:55 left following the 10th Highlander team foul.
 
Texas-Pan American's ninth team foul of the half put Arjun Ohri on the line for a one-and-one and he gave NJIT what would be its next-to-last lead, 47-45, with 8:42 to play.
 
Ohri stole the ball on the next possession, but the Highlanders gave it right back, beginning their string of four turnovers in four possessions, as they went almost three minutes without a shot of any kind, jump-starting a Texas-Pan American run of 7-2 in and ultimately 13-6 that would prove decisive.
 
The second game of NJIT's Texas road trip and the final road game on the 2011-12 schedule is Saturday at 7:05 pm (CST), when the Highlanders visit Houston Baptist. NJIT won the first meeting, the Great West Conference opener, 85-62, when HBU visited Newark on January 19.