Thursday, January 8
7:05 pm
Montana State University
at
Idaho State
Danny Robison and the Bobcats play at Idaho State Thursday
Photo by: R. Dean Hendrickson
First League Road Trip Leads Bobcats to Idaho State on Thursday
1/7/2015 12:30:00 PM | Men's Basketball
MSU visits Holt Arena for first time since 2012
The math is revealing.
After returning from a season-opening four-game odyssey, Montana State shot 43.7% from the floor in the next five games. That stretch included the team's three 2014-15 wins, and a near miss at Wyoming. That game in Laramie marked the first missed by sophomore guard Stephan Holm due to a head injury, and in the five games after that MSU shot 36.4%. The team dropped all five contests.
Montana State's first-year head coach Brian Fish puts the absence of Holm, MSU's top deep threat, succinctly. "Our offense has been in a rut since he's been gone." Holm is expected to be cleared for about 20 minutes of action on the team's first league road trip, which begins Thursday at Idaho State. Tipoff is 7:05 pm in Holt Arena.
Again, math supports Fish's stance. In nine games, Holm has 22 three-pointers. Only Michael Dison's 28 – compiled in 14 games – stands above Holm's total. The X's and O's line up on the side of Holm providing a major boost as well, Fish says. "To add him back will spread (opposing defenses) out a little more. When you take a guy, Steph, out of the lineup for five or six games… it puts all the pressure on Mike Dison to make shots, and we've asked Marcus (Colbert) to score a little more to cover for the loss and that's made him more of a shot-first point guard."
The emphasis on three-point shooting and efficient scoring becomes more acute in Thursday's matchup, because of Idaho State's stingy zone defense and the presence of the Bengals' hot-shooting Chris Hansen, who averages 16.2 points a game. "We're going to see a lot of zone, probably 40 minutes of zone," said senior forward Eric Norman. "They've got a guy who can shoot the ball really well, Chris Hansen. We have to get a hand up on every shot, we've got to take away his air space, got to get into him, not let him get free."
Regardless of what else happens, Fish knows he'll get one important element from his squad each time out. "The one thing I've liked about this team is that we've consistently played hard all year and have given great effort," he said. "I thought Thursday against North Dakota was our worst effort of the year, so that was definitely a step back. Then on Saturday I thought we played hard. Then on Saturday I thought we played hard but one or two mistakes cost us. It's been that way the last five or six games, we're right there. I know the final score was eight or 10, but we were one possession down with a chance to win in the last couple minutes of each game."
Fish knows that his squad could receive a boost by supplementing that effort with confidence. "We've got to find a way to win some games on the road to make up for these (home losses). That would give us some confidence. But one thing I'll tell ya is that the guys gave great effort and were really active (Monday in practice). We need to get a win to get feeling good again."
After Thursday's matchup of 3-11 squads that each dropped their first two conference games last weekend, Montana State travels further south to meet defending Big Sky Champion Weber State on Saturday at 7:05 pm in Ogden's Dee Events Center.
After returning from a season-opening four-game odyssey, Montana State shot 43.7% from the floor in the next five games. That stretch included the team's three 2014-15 wins, and a near miss at Wyoming. That game in Laramie marked the first missed by sophomore guard Stephan Holm due to a head injury, and in the five games after that MSU shot 36.4%. The team dropped all five contests.
Montana State's first-year head coach Brian Fish puts the absence of Holm, MSU's top deep threat, succinctly. "Our offense has been in a rut since he's been gone." Holm is expected to be cleared for about 20 minutes of action on the team's first league road trip, which begins Thursday at Idaho State. Tipoff is 7:05 pm in Holt Arena.
Again, math supports Fish's stance. In nine games, Holm has 22 three-pointers. Only Michael Dison's 28 – compiled in 14 games – stands above Holm's total. The X's and O's line up on the side of Holm providing a major boost as well, Fish says. "To add him back will spread (opposing defenses) out a little more. When you take a guy, Steph, out of the lineup for five or six games… it puts all the pressure on Mike Dison to make shots, and we've asked Marcus (Colbert) to score a little more to cover for the loss and that's made him more of a shot-first point guard."
The emphasis on three-point shooting and efficient scoring becomes more acute in Thursday's matchup, because of Idaho State's stingy zone defense and the presence of the Bengals' hot-shooting Chris Hansen, who averages 16.2 points a game. "We're going to see a lot of zone, probably 40 minutes of zone," said senior forward Eric Norman. "They've got a guy who can shoot the ball really well, Chris Hansen. We have to get a hand up on every shot, we've got to take away his air space, got to get into him, not let him get free."
Regardless of what else happens, Fish knows he'll get one important element from his squad each time out. "The one thing I've liked about this team is that we've consistently played hard all year and have given great effort," he said. "I thought Thursday against North Dakota was our worst effort of the year, so that was definitely a step back. Then on Saturday I thought we played hard. Then on Saturday I thought we played hard but one or two mistakes cost us. It's been that way the last five or six games, we're right there. I know the final score was eight or 10, but we were one possession down with a chance to win in the last couple minutes of each game."
Fish knows that his squad could receive a boost by supplementing that effort with confidence. "We've got to find a way to win some games on the road to make up for these (home losses). That would give us some confidence. But one thing I'll tell ya is that the guys gave great effort and were really active (Monday in practice). We need to get a win to get feeling good again."
After Thursday's matchup of 3-11 squads that each dropped their first two conference games last weekend, Montana State travels further south to meet defending Big Sky Champion Weber State on Saturday at 7:05 pm in Ogden's Dee Events Center.
Players Mentioned
Thursday, March 03
Friday, November 05
Monday, November 01
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