It's a history making weekend for EWU basketball

Defense is a word that has hardly found its way into the lexicon of the Eastern Washington University men's basketball team this year.

But when your offense is saddled by the loss of the nation's leading scorer, desperate measures need to be considered.

And it worked as the Eagles swept both Montana and Montana State in Big Sky Conference men's basketball play for the first time in over a decade.

The trip started with a 75-69 win over the Montana Grizzlies. With the victory, the Eagles ended a 12-game losing streak in Missoula at Dahlberg Arena, dating back to a 71-52 win Feb. 7, 2004.

Then, despite a season-low field goal shooting percentage of just 35 percent, Eastern rallied late to earn a 61-51 win at Worthington Arena in Bozeman over the Bobcats.

Eastern is now 9-1 in Big Sky play, 18-5 overall. The Eagles are ranked 12th again in this week's Collegeinsider.com mid-major poll.

The sweep sets up a big showdown tonight (Feb. 12) with current conference leader, Sacramento State (10-1, 16-6) at 6:05 p.m. at Reese Court. Eastern completes its home-stand with a 2:05 p.m. tipoff against Portland State (5-6, 11-10), Saturday, Feb. 14.

"We got our school's first road sweep in a long time, and we did it both nights with defense," EWU head coach Jim Hayford said.

The effort started in a traditional house of horrors for the Eagles, Missoula, where, despite having top scorer Tyler Harvey not even make the road trip as his thigh contusion heals, others picked up the slack on both ends of the court.

Senior point guard Drew Brandon equaled a career-high 27 points. Junior Venky Jois, hobbled recently with an ankle sprain, finished with 12 points, nine rebounds and equaled his career highs with seven assists and four steals. Substituting for Harvey, Felix Von Hofe scored 12.

Eastern held Montana's two leading scorers - Martin Breunig and Jordan Gregory - to a combined 21 points on 6 of 24 shooting after both entered the game averaging more than 17 per game.

Eastern held Montana scoreless for a 3 minute, 50 second stretch with the game clock under 10 minutes, breaking a 52-52 tie, outscoring the Grizzlies 10-2 to take a 63-54 lead with 6:42 to play.

"It is a great win and I'm really happy for our team," Hayford said. "There were some Eastern fans who made the drive over to Missoula and it is great to send them back with a win."

Eastern shot 51 percent from the field but limited Montana (8-3, 12-10) to just under 46 percent and held a team just under its 70 points per game average.

Brandon led four Eagles in double-figures Saturday in Bozeman with 15 points and 12 rebounds for a double-double. Jois added 13 points, sophomore Ognjen Miljkovic scored 11 points and true freshman Bogdan Bliznyuk finished with 10 points.

Eastern, which trailed by as many at eight in the second half, went on a 17-3 run and held Montana State to 1-of-14 shooting during an 11-minute span to turn things around. The Bobcats fell to 4-19 overall and 1-10 in conference play.

"We came in here and gutted it out," Hayford said. "We held them to 32 percent shooting in the game, we forced 20 turnovers and we gave up only 17 second-half points."

Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com.