HOUSTON -- Jherrod Stiggers had 15 points on 4 of 7 shooting from behind the arc as the Houston Cougars pulled away midway through the first half for an 80-62 win over the UT-San Antonio Roadrunners Thursday night.

TaShawn Thomas finished with 14 points and six rebounds with four blocks. Thomas was 6 of 7 from the field for Houston (3-0), which shot 55.8 percent from the field in the game.

Despite the hot shooting from the field, Houston struggled from the free throw line shooting 53.8 percent (14 of 26).

Hyjii Thomas had 22 points and six rebounds to lead UTSA (0-2). Jordan Sims added 13 points and Keon Lewis chipped in 10 points for the Roadrunners, who shot 32.8 percent from the field and hit just 5 of 19 from behind the arc.

The Roadrunners shot just 20.7 percent from the field in the first half in falling behind 36-19.

Houston, which shot 52 percent in the first half, used a 20-4 run over a 10-minute stretch of the first half to grow the lead to 19, 35-16, on a free throw by Danrad Knowles with 2:39 left in the opening half. Stiggers had nine points in the run on three straight 3-pointers.

UTSA closed the lead to seven, 43-36, five minutes into the second half on a Hyjii Thomas 3-pointer to cap a 10-0 run in which Hyjii Thomas scored all of the Roadrunners' points.

The Cougars countered with a 7-0 run of their own to take the lead back to 14 on a Tione Womack jumper with 13:22 remaining in the game.

The Roadrunners had one more run in them and got the lead down to 56-49 with 9:14 left in the game on a Sims 3-pointer, but Houston responded again with a 15-1 spurt over the next 4:30 to push the lead to 21 on a Stiggers jumper. LeRon Barnes had seven points in the run for Houston.