A cavalcade of dunks helps define strong second half for ThunderWolves.

PUEBLO, Colo. (GoThunderWolves.com - Jan. 8, 2011) - This season, a slow start for the ThunderWolves had always been a recipe for failure.

Saturday night, the Pack turned that conventional wisdom harshly on its ear, coming back from 1-for-7 start to the game and a deficit that was as bad as 11 points before roaring back, going on a tear in the second half and downing Western State 76-62 Saturday.

After going into the break trailing 31-26, a major accomplishment in of itself, the Pack started the second half on a 10-2 run, culminating in a pretty dunk by Kris Lawrie (Sr., Gardena, Calif.) that gave the ThunderWolves its first lead of the game - a lead it would never lose.

In one of the best halves in recent memory, CSU-Pueblo went on to outscore Western State 50-31, shooting a ridiculous 73.8 percent from the floor and landing five monumentous dunks, four coming from the Pack's emerging slam-master, Andre Martin (Jr., San Diego, Calif.), as the ThunderWolves seemed to do no wrong.  In the end, five ThunderWolves scored in double digits, the first time since Feb. 20 last season that the Pack has accomplished the feat.  Leading the barrage was Lawrie with 18 points and Martin, who added 17.

Now at 6-7 overall and 3-6 in RMAC play, CSU-Pueblo now has a tough task ahead of it - taking on conference-leading and nationally-ranked Metro State in Denver on Friday, then following it up with the lowest-ranked team in the conference, Regis, on Saturday.