Loss to Idaho State will keep outright title in balance until Saturday's Portland State game
By PAUL DELANEY
Staff Reporter
The Eastern Washington University women's basketball team came up one piece short of completing their Big Sky Conference championship puzzle last weekend.
Eastern split a pair of road games, beating Weber State 70-56 on Friday night to clinch at least a share of the regular season conference title. Saturday, however, they lost their game to Idaho State, 71-63, as well as an early opportunity to wrap up a first-ever regular season title and the host role for next week's conference tournament.
The Eagles will look to find that missing piece this Saturday afternoon when they meet Portland State in a 2:05 p.m. contest at Reese Court for senior day. A win earns Eastern (11-4 BSC, 18-10 overall) that coveted BSC tournament, which runs March 11-13.
Simply put, an Eastern loss really complicates things, especially if Sacramento State (9-5, 14-13) beats Weber State and Idaho State on the road and improves on their recent tear through the conference that has seen the Hornets go 10-1 in their last 11 games.
Coming into the Idaho State game, Eastern head coach Wendy Schuller saw trouble and knew the Bengals would be tough. “Idaho State played well and they shot really well in the second half,” she said. “Part of that is them and part of that is us not defending when we needed to.”
Eastern fell behind early, 14-3 by the 13:58 mark of the first half, but rallied to outscore ISU 30-15 and lead at the break, 33-29. They maintained that lead until the Bengals tied it at 51-all with 5:48 to go and would lead by as many as eight at 65-57 with a minute to play.
But Eastern didn't fold. Chene Cooper led a rally scoring five points that got the Eagles back to within three, 66-63 with 41 seconds to play. The Bengals secured the win to improve to 9-6 in conference play and 14-14 overall by hitting their final six straight free throws. Cooper led the Eagles in scoring for the second-straight game with 19 points, the only Eastern player in double-figures.
“I felt that we were a little bit tired and I hadn't felt that in any games this year,” Schuller said. “I thought we played hard, we just didn't play great.” The Bengals shot 54.5 percent from the field including 6-of-13 from 3-point range. The Eagles shot 46.3 percent from the field but were just 4-of-14 from behind the arc.
The Eagles certainly didn't have that swagger of a pending champion on Friday at Weber as they fell behind early, 11-4. “We got off to a really slow start against Weber State,” Schuller explained. “Golly, about the first five minutes of the game I was wondering if we'd ever score on this trip.”
“But once we got the lid off the basket we did a pretty good job,” Schuller added. Eastern would outscore the Wildcats 27-14 the remainder of the half, lead 31-25 at the break and never again trail.
Cooper scored 23 points on 8-of-13 shooting, including a perfect 6-of-6 from the free throw line. Julie Piper added 15 points and eight rebounds, seven on the offensive end. Kyla Evans also finished in double-figures with 10 points.
“I was disappointed in (the) Idaho State (game) – obviously first and foremost because it was our chance to win it (the conference title) outright and know we were going to host the tournament,” Schuller said.
“I thought it took a little shine off the fact that we won the conference this weekend,” Schuller said. “That's something our kids need to be proud of. It didn't feel like that when we got back.”
That slight empty feeling might have come from visions of potential confusion swimming around everyone's heads.
“Boy we were looking at it today and it's crazy,” Schuller said. “There's everything you can imagine. The tiebreaker scenario – the only team that can catch us is Sacramento State. Sac is playing really well.”
With all the scenarios, about anybody can finish second and about anybody can finish sixth except for Eastern, according to Schuller. One realistic outcome Schuller said was one of, “us being first and a five-way tie for second,” with five teams at 10-6. “Good luck to the league figuring that out,” she added.
Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com.
Reader Comments(0)