Boxscore

RUSTON ? Louisiana Tech captured at least a share of the 2007 Western Athletic Conference regular season crown with a 74-56 win over New Mexico State Wednesday night at the Thomas Assembly Center.

Tech (17-12, 12-4 WAC) must now wait on the results from Boise State?s final two games against Fresno State Thursday and Hawaii Saturday to determine whether they will be outright champions or have to share the crown with the Broncos. A Boise State loss in either game would make the Lady Techsters the outright champs.

?I?m proud of this basketball team,? said Tech head coach Chris Long. ?This year hasn?t been perfect. We?ve had plenty of rough nights but these kids never gave up, even when they started the year 2-7. They?ve continued to believe, and I?ve never once given up.?

The WAC title is the sixth straight for Louisiana Tech, and the 15th consecutive regular season conference title dating back to the program?s years as a member of the Sun Belt Conference.

Louisiana Tech?s four seniors combined to score 43 points and pull down 30 rebounds as Ty Moore, Shan Moore, Tamika Kursh and Amber Metoyer all played for the final time in Ruston.

The win would not come easy for Tech as New Mexico State (10-17, 5-10) would not go away easily. Tech held a slim 22-21 lead after a Sherell Neal jumper at the 4:51 mark before the Lady Techsters used an 8-0 run over the next three minutes to increase its advantage to 29-21.

Tech led 33-26 at the half.

?New Mexico State made it tough on us on the offensive end,? Long said. ?They made it tough on us to score inside. We also missed some easy shots in the first half. However, we didn?t get frustrated and we hit those shots down the stretch.?

With Tech lead 37-34 after a Monique Bribiescas jumper at the 16:19 mark of the second half, the Lady Techsters went on a 27-8 run over the next nine minutes to put the game away.

The final 11 points of that run were scored by the Tech bench.

?I thought this was a total effort tonight,? Long said. ?Everyone contributed which is how it should be. We are a deeper basketball team than we were last year.?

Ty Moore led Tech with 17 points, while Shan Moore added 12 points and Jo Sneed scored 10.

Anikia Jawara had 14 points and Sherell Neal added 13 points and 13 rebounds for the Aggies.