Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 Okay, so it has no kin to pitching horseshoes or lobbing coins at a line, competitions wherein getting close might often win one the trophy. "Close" in basketball is, the sages advise, a losers' lament. When that final buzzer sounds there can be but one winner.

     And when the dust settled Thursday night at the Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship gym, the visiting Oklahoma City University Stars had won a pair of Sooner Athletic Conference games over the University of North Texas at Dallas.  The Trailblazers women lost, 73-66, in the opener and the men later fell, 71-70, in an overtime joyride.

     For followers of the SAC newcomers, however, the evening offered up something more than another defeat.  It showcased another defination of "close" to consider. as the young Dallas teams, when performing at a high level, can, indeed, compete against their conference counterparts.

     They made the opposition work for it.  The Stars women upped their season mark to 7-1 )2-1 in SAC play) and the men improved to 3-5 on the season, the same record UNTD has. The difference is the Stars men are 2-0 in league play while Josh Howard's squad is yet to win in league play (0-3).

     The Trailblazers women are now 6-3 and 1-3.

     There was, in fact,  momentum gained in the hosts' defeat. Now, to see if it carries over to Saturday afternoon's date with SAC rival John Brown University.

     It was an arching 3-pointer by UNTD's Christian Plummer with just seconds remaining in the nightcap that knotted the score at 66-66, forcing the first OT game in UNTD's brief history.
The game had seesawed all evening as OCU jumped to a quick first half lead that had vanished by halftime.  The Trailblazers, playing an energetic defense and an aggressive offense, led 33-28 at intermission.
 
     Through the second half, it was much the same as the score was tied on multiple occasions. On more than one occasion, it appeared the Trailblazers were "close" to an upset win. That notion came to an end with just 23 seconds left in overtime when the Stars' Romerio Spence hit on both ends of his free throw shots to give the visitors the victory.

     Rashaun Coleman powered the Stars attack with 26 points and teammate Spence contributed 15.  Plummer had 14, Larry Rusk 13, and Donovan Deal 10 for UNTD.

     Despite the seven-point loss, Rodney Belcher's Trailblazers women put up one of their best performances of the new season. The roadblocks to a possible win were numerous missed layups early in the game, a domination of the middle by OCU defenders, and the fact reliable veteran Brooke Lopez was forced to leave the game with a back injury in the second quarter. 

Still, the hosts battled back from a 34-31 halftime deficit to lead, 49-48, at the end of the third. A brief cold spell by UNTD shooters allowed the Stars to move out to a nine-point lead with just over six minutes remaining. The Trailblazers narrowed the Stars' margin to three with just two minutes on the clock, but that was as close as they were able to get.

     Mykayla Dumas had her best performance of the season as she led the UNTD scoring with 25. Zyunn Cormier came off the bench to add 16 and Shandrea Yeldell contributed 15.

     Gametimes Saturday at OCBF are 2 p.m. for the women and 4 p.m. for the men.