Starting off the regular season, UTSA men’s basketball faced the Cowboys of Hardin Simmons Friday night at the Convocation Center.

Coming off with a win against UMHB, the Roadrunners were shooting for another win of that caliber.

The Runners have gone 22-4 all time in home openers, and against teams from the American Southwest Conference, they have gone 24-3.

The last time these two teams played, the Runners escaped with a three-point victory, 89-86, back in 1990.

The game started off slow for both teams with the score 8-6 at the 12-minute mark. There was considerable passing and very little shooting from either side.

The Runners were 8 for 24 in field goals and missed all seven three-point attempts in the first half.

A bright spot for the Runners came from freshman Devin Gibson who started off the night with 10 total points the first half, six of them being free throws.

The Runners went into the locker room up by 10, the score 29-19.

In the second half, junior Joey Shank found his hot spot, draining three 3-pointers and scoring a team high, 11 points in the second half.

Junior Travis Gabbidon added some spark downing a couple of big lay-ups to get the crowd on their feet.

The runners began to pull away from the Cowboys as Gibson had another 10-point half helping to win the game 69 – 47.Gabbidon finished the game with 14 points and four rebounds, and Shank contributed 13 points.

Senior Isaiah Allen grabbed a game high of five total rebounds. Gibson finished the game with 20 points, five steals and four boards.

UTSA saw some valuable playing time off the bench from newcomer junior Orrin Greer and freshman Russ Permenter, each scoring five points.

“The team is already averaging more points per game than last season,” Head Coach Brooks Thompson said.

“There are so many new players, it is just working on the little things like rebounding and shooting that we need to do.”