LAKE CHARLES – Larry Johnson scored 14 of his game-high 23 points in the second half as the Cowboys posted a dominant second half to beat Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, 70-54, in front of a national television audience on ESPNU and locking up at least the No. 2 seed for the Southland Conference Tournament.
 
The freshman added 10 rebounds to record his second double-double on the season.
 
McNeese, now 23-5 overall and 16-3 in league play, was without defending league player of the year Javohn Garcia who has been battling leg issues and was listed day-to-day prior to the game. The Cowboys picked up their 26^th straight win at the Townsley Law Arena and 33^rd-consecutive win over Southland Conference competition.
 
Corpus Christi fell to 14-14 and 10-9 and is in a tie for fifth place with Nicholls. SFA maintains a two-game lead over the Cowboys in the conference standings after holding off a late Nicholls rally for a three-point win.
 
McNeese led 24-23 at the half after falling behind 8-0 and 11-3 early. A 10-0 lead followed and the Cowboys took a 13-11 lead after a Johnson second-chance tip-in.
 
Nicholas Shogbonyo, who led the Islanders with 20 points, completed a Corpus 5-0 run with one of four three-pointers made in the half to give AMCC back the lead at 22-19 with 3:04 on the clock.
 
Tyshawn Archie then gave the Cowboys their one-point lead going into the half after hitting his team's first three of the game after miss-firing on the first 10 attempts. Archie finished with 17 points.
 
The second half was all McNeese.
 
The Cowboys connected on 63 percent of their shots in the half, making 15 of 24, including 3 of 7 from long range, and strung together a 12-0 run early in the half, turning a 26-24 deficit into a 36-26 lead with 15:57 to play.
 
In that run, Johnson electrified the crowd with two dunks while Jerrell Colbert posted a nice slam off a Johnson assist.
 
Corpus rallied behind back-to-back 3s by Shogbonyo to cut the lead to 38-34. McNeese answered with eight straight points, the last six off back-to-back three-pointers by Johnson to make it 46-34 with 11:55 remaining.
 
McNeese kept the double-digit lead for most of the remainder of the game and grabbed its largest lead with 36 seconds left after Johnson connected on a couple of free throws to make it 70-51.
 
The Cowboys turned the Islanders over 22 times in the game and scored 25 points from those. McNeese held a 33-29 advantage in rebounding and scored 13 second-chance points off 11 offensive boards.
 
McNeese will close out its home regular season schedule on Monday when it hosts UTRGV at 6:30. Three seniors will be recognized prior to tip-off – Javohn Garcia, DJ Richards Jr., and Jerrell Colbert.
 
Postgame Notebook:
• McNeese clinched at least the No. 2 seed for the Southland Conference Tournament and a double-bye to the semifinal round.
• McNeese has won 26 straight home games, 29 straight home conference regular season games, and 33 straight home games against conference competition (including tournament games).
• With his 23 points, Larry Johnson has now scored 470 points on the season to rank No. 3 on the McNeese freshman scoring list behind Joe Dumars (527) and Henry Ray (492).
• McNeese is 13-0 at home this season.
• The Cowboys are 81-16 the last three years including 52-5 in Southland Conference play.
• 18-0 this year when leading at the half.
• With 5 assists, Garwey Dual has 117 on the season, 11 away from moving into the school's single-season top 10 list.