Saturday, January 28
Cheney, WA
6:00 PM PT
Montana State University
at
at EASTERN WASHINGTON
Mo Fall (right) is questionable entering Saturday's game at EWU.
Photo by: Kelly Gorham
Bobcats Visit Eastern Washington on Saturday
1/27/2012 6:06:00 PM | Men's Basketball
With six three league road wins in the bank, MSU looks to avenge conference-opening loss
Brad Huse knows Montana State's come-from-behind win at Portland State is something to enjoy, not only for the 15-point second half lead overcome but because the Cats now hold three Big Sky road wins, a nice trump card to hold with the post-season on the not-so-distant horizon.
MSU Game Notes vs. Eastern Washington
But don't expect the enjoyment to last long.
“It's another road win for us, which is huge,” Huse said. “It helps catapult us into that second half (of the league season). Whenever you get road wins, that adds up for the team. But we're not in position to worry a lot about the standings. We have another big challenge on Saturday.”
Calling Montana State's game at Eastern Washington a challenge Saturday may be under-selling the idea. The Eagles spanked MSU 82-66 in Bozeman on December 28 – exactly one month before Saturday's rematch – in an EWU victory that may have been easier than the final score indicates. Montana State never led in the game, trailed by double-digits five minutes in and by as many as 14 in the first half, and never got within single digits in the game's final 14 minutes.
Collin Chiverton entered that game, and this one, as a strong league newcomer of the year candidate for Eastern, and scored 12 points. But guard Cliff Colimon was the game's main storyline, pouring in 22 points while dealing three assists and snagging a pair of steals. He hit four three-pointers, and it felt that night as if each one was a dagger.
“Eastern has really good players, athletes that can win important matchups,” Huse said. “That makes them a very difficult team to deal with defensively.”
Fast forward from late December to the end of January, and Montana State is the team that makes the turn into the Big Sky season's second half as a hot team. The Bobcats have lost only once since their league opener, a hard-fought defeat at conference favorite Weber State, and now stand third in the league standings at 6-2. Weber State is 8-0, while Montana sits comfortably in second at 7-1, right on Weber's heels with a big end-of-February showdown with the Wildcats in Missoula lurking in the background. Eastern Washington is 3-5 in Big Sky play, tied for sixth in the league.
Playing without defensive anchor Mohamed Fall, the team's starting center and the Big Sky's top shot-blocker, MSU hunkered down defensively in the second half Thursday. After the teams combined for 80 points before the intermission, the shooting cooled and the pace slowed and MSU's defense held the Vikings to 33% shooting in the second half and just seven points in the game's final eleven-and-a-half minutes.
“We knew we had to get stops,” Huse said of his team's second-half surge on Thursday, and that they did. Now the task of stopping the explosive, balanced Eagles looms for MSU. Chiverton averages 17.5 points, while Colimon brings a 14.6 per-game average to Saturday's contest. Cliff Ederaine scores 10.6 points a game with a team high 7.5 rebounds.
Tipoff is 7:05 pm MT Saturday at Cheney's Reese Court.
MSU Game Notes vs. Eastern Washington
But don't expect the enjoyment to last long.
“It's another road win for us, which is huge,” Huse said. “It helps catapult us into that second half (of the league season). Whenever you get road wins, that adds up for the team. But we're not in position to worry a lot about the standings. We have another big challenge on Saturday.”
Calling Montana State's game at Eastern Washington a challenge Saturday may be under-selling the idea. The Eagles spanked MSU 82-66 in Bozeman on December 28 – exactly one month before Saturday's rematch – in an EWU victory that may have been easier than the final score indicates. Montana State never led in the game, trailed by double-digits five minutes in and by as many as 14 in the first half, and never got within single digits in the game's final 14 minutes.
Collin Chiverton entered that game, and this one, as a strong league newcomer of the year candidate for Eastern, and scored 12 points. But guard Cliff Colimon was the game's main storyline, pouring in 22 points while dealing three assists and snagging a pair of steals. He hit four three-pointers, and it felt that night as if each one was a dagger.
“Eastern has really good players, athletes that can win important matchups,” Huse said. “That makes them a very difficult team to deal with defensively.”
Fast forward from late December to the end of January, and Montana State is the team that makes the turn into the Big Sky season's second half as a hot team. The Bobcats have lost only once since their league opener, a hard-fought defeat at conference favorite Weber State, and now stand third in the league standings at 6-2. Weber State is 8-0, while Montana sits comfortably in second at 7-1, right on Weber's heels with a big end-of-February showdown with the Wildcats in Missoula lurking in the background. Eastern Washington is 3-5 in Big Sky play, tied for sixth in the league.
Playing without defensive anchor Mohamed Fall, the team's starting center and the Big Sky's top shot-blocker, MSU hunkered down defensively in the second half Thursday. After the teams combined for 80 points before the intermission, the shooting cooled and the pace slowed and MSU's defense held the Vikings to 33% shooting in the second half and just seven points in the game's final eleven-and-a-half minutes.
“We knew we had to get stops,” Huse said of his team's second-half surge on Thursday, and that they did. Now the task of stopping the explosive, balanced Eagles looms for MSU. Chiverton averages 17.5 points, while Colimon brings a 14.6 per-game average to Saturday's contest. Cliff Ederaine scores 10.6 points a game with a team high 7.5 rebounds.
Tipoff is 7:05 pm MT Saturday at Cheney's Reese Court.
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