Men’s Basketball: NMSU defeats UTEP 62-58 at the Haskins Center

It was much closer than the first contest of the season, but the end result was the same.

New Mexico State defeated UTEP for the second time in 2018, winning a 62-58 slugfest at the Don Haskins Center Wednesday night.

NMSU previously beat UTEP 96-69 at the Pan American Center just 19 days earlier.

UTEP jumped out to an early lead and controlled much of the first half behind a strong start from Evan Gilyard, who scored a game-high 18 points Wednesday. Gilyard also grabbed nine rebounds and dished our four assists.

But the Aggies began to rally late in the first half to take a 28-26 lead into the break.

NMSU was led by Ivan Aurrecoechea, who scored 15 points and pulled down six rebounds in the win.

The Aggies used their depth to eventually grind out a four-point win to capture their ninth consecutive victory in the series.

NMSU saw 11 different players score, but the biggest basket came on a runner in the lane from Terrell Brown with about 15 seconds to go that gave NMSU a four-point lead and effectively ended the game.

Brown would hit a pair of free throws moments later to cement NMSU’s victory.

The low-scoring game was marred in part by an excess of turnovers. The teams combined for 39 turnovers, 22 of them belonging to the Miners.

UTEP fell to 2-4 overall while NMSU improved to 5-1 on the season with their lone loss coming to Saint Mary’s.

The Miners will return to the Don Haskins Center Saturday at 7 p.m. for a matchup with Northwestern State.

The Aggies are also at home on Saturday at 7 p.m. for a contest against Washington State. NMSU will then play New Mexico three days later on Dec. 4 before traveling to Kansas City for a matchup against the Kansas Jayhawks on the 8th.