The Sam Houston Bearkats’ season ended Tuesday night with a 79-65 loss to the UTEP Miners in the Conference USA tournament.

This was the third time both teams had seen each other this season, with both teams winning one game in their regular season matchups. The Bearkats started the game on fire, leading 13-3 at one point in the first half, but it was all UTEP from that point.

The Miners led 36-30 at halftime. SHSU shot just 2-of-19 from the three-point line.  The Bearkats also struggled defensively in the second half, allowing 43 points.  

“We seem to be the unluckiest team in America in every single [game] that happens” Sam Houston head coach Chris Mudge said. “I think in the first half we let them get comfortable with giving them some open looks and they have great players, and when you let great players make a couple and get confident, they’re able to make some more, and that’s on us and on me because let them get going and let them feel good, they stepped up in an important game and a made them.” 

Lamar Wilkerson scored a team-high 22 points for the Bearkats. Kalifa Sahko added 18 points, while Marcus Boykin finished with 15 points.  

“It’s tough right now” Wilkerson said after the game. “I had high hopes, even though we didn’t start as good as we wanted to, we were going to come and do what we had to do to get to the tournament, we could have went anywhere, but we decided to stay here because we wanted to do something that hasn’t been done here in a while and that’s go to the NCAA tournament, but we fell short.” 

With his 22 points, Wilkerson became the first player in Sam Houston’s Division I history to average 20 points per game in a season.