ALPINE, Texas -- Concordia Texas was able to draw within a point at 71-70 with just under four minutes play Thursday afternoon in the opening game of the American Southwest Conference Men's Basketball Tournament, but the ASC West No. 2-seeded Tornados were unable to close out the contest against a tough Louisiana College program in an 84-76 setback.

The ASC East No. 3-seed Wildcats (13-12) outscored CTX 13-4 in the final four minutes of regulation to secure the victory. All four of the Tornados' points came from the charity stripe in that stretch. 

Payton Brown-Simon let the Concordia with 16 points off the bench. Ephriam Price added 14 and Demarco Richardson tallied 12 to round out the leading scorers for the Tornados.

LC's Anthony Gaines, Jr. recorded a double-double, scoring 31 points and grabbing 14 rebounds to pace his squad to the victory. Gaines was 10-of-18 from the field and 10-for-12 at the line and personally accounted for nearly a third of the Wildcats' offensive output and just under half of the team's rebounds.

Concordia opened the contest with the lead and led for the first 10 minutes, but an LC run put the Wildcats on top just inside the midway point of the first half. Soon, Louisiana stretched out the lead to 12 with 4:46 before the break, but Concordia chipped away to make it a four-point contest with 2:01 left in the half.  The Wildcats made four consecutive free throws to go into the intermission with a seven-point advantage.

The Tornados end the 2015-16 season at 15-11 and posted a conference record of 8-6. It was Concordia's sixth straight season over the .500 mark and 10th consecutive campaign with 10-plus victories. It was the fourth season in a row of 15 or more wins.

The squad set a new program record in scoring average (95.0 ppg).