Despite a slow start, No. 23 Texas A&M men’s basketball put on an offensive showcase with a 97-71 win over Lamar on Monday night at Reed Arena. Four players scored double digits as the Aggies got 51 points from their bench.
The game was a final tuneup before A&M plays its second power conference opponent of the season in No. 21 Ohio State on Friday. Here are a few takeaways from the Aggies’ win:
A&M shook off a slow start to take a commanding lead
In contrast to last week’s win against East Texas A&M, the Aggies took some time to get going with just nine points through five minutes of action. But when A&M found its groove, it held on to it for the rest of the night. It took a 50-29 lead into halftime and maintained that intensity through the second half.
“I thought, collectively, we were all on the same page,” coach Buzz Williams, who earned his 350th career win, said. “I thought there was great symmetry on what we’re trying to accomplish on both ends of the floor. … Pleased in many respects, for sure.”
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Senior SMU transfer guard Zhuric Phelps led the team in scoring for the second game in a row with 16 points and didn’t slow down with 11 coming in the final 20 minutes. He added a team-high seven assists in 28 minutes of action. Graduate G Wade Taylor IV posted 15 points on a near-even split between both halves. The Lancaster product hit a trio of three-pointers on 50% shooting from long range.
Texas A&M guard Zhuric Phelps (1) tries to get past Lamar guard Alexis Marmolejos (1) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game, Monday, Nov. 11, 2024, in College Station, Texas.(Sam Craft / AP)
“[Zhuric] changes our team,” graduate forward Henry Coleman III said. “Testament to him, he’s the same person every single day, so it’s not a shock to us when, right off an injury, he comes in and just is Zhuric and he’s putting up the numbers he’s putting up.
“His leadership has also helped us a lot. It’s somebody that we really need on the floor, and he makes a huge impact, not just scoring, but in other things as well.”
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The Aggies stayed hot from three-point range
A&M turned up the temperature from beyond the arc and rode it to an insurmountable lead at the break. The Aggies nailed eight of their first 12 three-point attempts and finished the night going 12-of-26 from long range.
Taylor and graduate Nebraska transfer guard CJ Wilcher combined for six three-pointers on a 54.5% clip while senior forward Andersson Garcia and junior F Solomon Washington also found the net from deep. On the opposite end, Lamar hit just one of eight three-point shots in the first half.
“I think those guys that are working to make it part of their game, we call it ‘shooting with Buzz’ shots because it’s the shots that I would shoot,” Williams said. “[Garcia] and [Washington] have improved in that regard.”
After finding most of their scoring in the paint through the first two games of the season, the Aggies showed their versatility on offense from beyond the arc.
“I don’t think we go into a game thinking we’re going to score in the paint or more from three-point,” Coleman said. “I think it’s just the feel of the game. We have really good basketball players out there, so I think guys are always prepared to take the right shot and I think tonight we took the right shot and when people were open they made those shots.”
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The Aggies showcased their depth down the bench
A&M’s offense didn’t end when its starters left the game as it gained 51 bench points, spurred by a career-high 15 from Garcia and 13 from Coleman. Garcia complemented his scoring with a team-high nine rebounds, while Coleman added seven boards, including five on the offensive glass. They each hit five of their seven shots.
Garcia’s previous career high of 14 points ironically came against A&M at Reed Arena in 2022 when he played for Mississippi State.
“It’s been a lot of shots that I’ve been putting up during the summer,” Garcia said. “Shoutout to the ocaches that have been trusting me and giving me the confidence to take those shots.
“I’m not trying to only help the offensive rebounding side, I’m trying to be able to provide this stuff to make good passes, making plays for my teammates and be able to provide scoring and stuff like that.”
Wilcher and senior G Manny Obaseki combined for 17 points despite Obaseki only appearing in the second half. With offensive capabilities throughout the lineup, the Aggies have options to find the basket even if it’s not someone’s night.
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East Texas native Kacey Musgraves on Wednesday announced a May 1 release date for her seventh studio album, Middle of Nowhere. And the country-pop singer released the album’s first single, “Dry Spell,” along with an accompanying video.
The saucy track bemoans a 335-day dry spell since her last romantic encounter, with double entendres aplenty. Musgraves and Hannah Lux Davis co-directed the song’s cheeky video, which is set in a grocery store and is ripe with fruit-touching and wistful stares.
Kacey Musgraves’ new album, “Middle of Nowhere,” is due out May 1.
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Musgraves was born in Sulphur Springs and raised in Golden, about 80 miles east of Dallas. She moved to Nashville in 2008.
The eight-time Grammy Award-winner had some help on Middle of Nowhere, which features guest appearances by Willie Nelson, Miranda Lambert, Billy Strings and Gregory Alan Isakov.
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Musgraves, who wrapped up her global “Deeper Well World Tour” in December, has emerged as one of the biggest stars in country music over the last decade-plus. Her debut album, 2013’s Same Trailer Different Park, won the Grammy for best country album, and she has topped the country charts multiple times since while earning critical acclaim.
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HOUSTON – A North Texas man faced execution on Wednesday for fatally stabbing his girlfriend and her 8-year-old son nearly 13 years ago.
Cedric Ricks was sentenced to death for the May 2013 killings of 30-year-old Roxann Sanchez and her son Anthony Figueroa at their apartment in Bedford, a suburb in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Sanchez’s 12-year-old son, Marcus Figueroa, was injured during the attack.
Ricks, 51, was scheduled to receive a lethal injection after 6 p.m. CDT at the state penitentiary in Huntsville, about 70 miles (113 kilometers) north of Houston.
His attorneys have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his execution, arguing that prosecutors violated Ricks’ constitutional rights by eliminating potential jurors on the basis of race. Previous appeals by Ricks that alleged ineffective counsel and called for the suppression of evidence in the case have been denied.
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In a 1986 ruling known as Batson v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court determined that excluding jurors because of their race violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
“At trial, Ricks already suspected that the State had singled out minority jurors to exclude them from his jury,” Ricks’ attorneys said in their petition to the Supreme Court.
Ricks’ lawyers said that notes prosecutors kept during the jury selection process and which were not obtained until 2021 show that prosecutors singled out minority jurors.
The Texas Attorney General’s Office said court records show the prosecution’s decisions in jury selection were “race neutral” and lower courts have already concluded that prosecutors’ actions were not discriminatory.
Ricks “viciously stabbed his girlfriend Roxann and her eight-year-old son Anthony to death,” the attorney general’s office said. “The public has a strong interest in enforcement of Ricks’ sentence.”
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The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles on Monday denied Ricks’ request for a 90-day reprieve or to commute his death sentence.
Prosecutors said Ricks and Sanchez were arguing in their apartment when Sanchez’ two sons from a previous marriage — Anthony and Marcus Figueroa — tried to break up the fight.
Ricks grabbed a knife from the kitchen and began to stab Sanchez multiple times, according to court records.
Marcus Figueroa ran to his bedroom closet and tried to call police. After killing Anthony Figuerora, Ricks resumed stabbing Marcus Figueroa, who survived the attack by playing dead. Ricks did not injure his then 9-month-old son, Isaiah, according to court records.
Ricks fled and was later arrested in Oklahoma.
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During his trial, Ricks testified that he had anger issues and had been defending himself against the two boys after they had come to their mother’s defense.
“Explaining my rage, I was upset. Things happen. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. I wish I could bring them back, like, right now,” said Ricks, who also apologized for the killings.
A day before the stabbings, Ricks had appeared in court after having been charged with assaulting Sanchez during a previous incident.
If the execution is carried out, Ricks would be the second person put to death this year in Texas and the sixth person in the country. Texas has historically held more executions than any other state.
Charles “Sonny” Burton, a 75-year-old inmate in Alabama, had been scheduled to be executed on Thursday. But Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey on Tuesday commuted his death sentence, reducing it to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Burton had been sentenced to death for a fatal shooting during a 1991 robbery even though he didn’t pull the trigger.
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The deadline for Texas families to apply for Texas Education Freedom Accounts (TEFA), also known as school vouchers, is on March 17.
TEFA is the $1 billion program that provides families with taxpayer money to help pay for private school. A longtime priority of Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas Republicans were able to pass it through the Legislature in a special session in 2025 after years of opposition from a coalition of Democrats and some Republicans worried about it negatively impacting public schools.
In the period from when applications opened on Feb. 4 through March 8, more than 160,000 Texas families have applied for the vouchers. Acting Texas Comptroller Kelly Hancock expects the program to reach capacity in its first year.
Texas school voucher application data by income
According to data from the Comptroller’s Office, 79% of the applicants for TEFA are already in private school. Lawmakers who advocated for the program said it was designed to give public school and homeschooled students an opportunity to switch to a private education.
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After applications close, the Comptroller’s Office will allocate funding to eligible families through a lottery that prioritizes students with disabilities first. Eleven percent of all applicants, about 18,000, are students with disabilities from families at or below 500% of the Federal Poverty Level.
Next on the priority list is students from low- and middle-income families. Just 35% of applicants are from households that earn 200% or less of the Federal Poverty Level:
200% or less of the Federal Poverty Level ($66,000 or less for a family of 4): 35%
Between 200% and 500% of the Federal Poverty Level ($66,001-$164,999 for a family of 4): 36%
500% or more of the Federal Poverty Level: ($165,000 or more for a family of 4): 29%
The Comptroller’s Office will report the waitlist to the Texas Legislature to determine funding for future years.
Texas school voucher application data by grade
The highest share of applications are for students who will be entering pre-K in the fall. Nearly 21,000 applications, about 12.8%, are in that cohort. The number of applicants per grade level declines as the students get older:
Pre-K: 20,975
Kindergarten: 15,777
First grade: 13,654
Second grade: 13,035
Third grade: 12,922
Fourth grade: 12,449
Fifth grade: 12,273
Sixth grade: 12,262
Seventh grade: 10,953
Eighth grade: 9,600
Ninth grade: 9,464
Tenth grade: 7.921
Eleventh grade: 6,731
Twelfth grade: 5,347
Texas school voucher applications by school district
The Comptroller’s Office also released a list that broke down the number of applications submitted in each school district across the state.
How much money public school districts will miss out on will depend on how many enrolled or prospective students they lose to private school because of TEFA, since state funds follow the student. But since 79% of applicants are already in private school, the extent of the impact on public school funding may be limited.
Here are the North Texas school districts with the most TEFA applications from within their boundaries:
