PORT ARTHUR, Texas – With the first seed out of the Region XIV South Zone up for grabs, Lamar State – Port Arthur refused to lose its chance at the top spot.

The Seahawks downed the Blinn men's basketball team 88-70 here Wednesday night to keep their chances at claiming the South Zone's top seed heading into the Region XIV Conference tournament.

For the Buccaneers, it was an even more difficult loss as they lost their leading scorer in sophomore Macari Brooks to an ankle injury.

"It was not one of our better performances tonight," Blinn (16-12, 6-11) coach Scott Schumacher said. "You have to give it to Lamar State, they're a great team with a lot of size."

Brooks went down early in the second half and the Bucs struggled to comeback from a 45-31 halftime deficit.

Although the Seahawks pulled ahead early in the first half, Blinn made a run to cut the their lead to one with eight minutes to play in the half. Lamar State, though, responded with a run of its own before halftime to pull back ahead.

Without Brooks, Blinn turned to freshman point guard Lionheart Leslie, who scored a team-high 19 points. Sophomore Eddie Alcantara scored nine. Freshman Roderick Harris led Blinn with eight rebounds.

"Lamar State made it tough on us tonight," Schumacher said. "We couldn't get much going the whole game."