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By PAUL DELANEY
Staff Reporter 

Another Saturday stumble stifles EWU title chase

Eagles go cold in final minutes in 77-76 loss to Grizzlies

 

Last updated 3/5/2015 at 10:52am

Paul Delaney

Eastern Washington's Drew Brandon drives to the basket against Montana's Fabijan Krslovic in last Saturday's Grizzlies' 77-76 win over the Eagles, played before 4,621, the fourth largest crowd in Reese Court history.

A troubling pattern has emerged with the Eastern Washington University men's basketball team.

In the last three weeks, the Eagles have won on Thursday, but lost each Saturday - and by excruciatingly close margins. Eastern lost 73-69 at Northern Arizona Feb. 21 and 68-66 at home to Portland State Feb. 14.

The third such of those defeats, a 77-76 loss to Montana before a raucous Reese Court crowd of 4,621, Feb. 28, might have been the most damaging to the Eagles' hope of winning a Big Sky regular season championship - and hosting the league tournament. It certainly could have been worse, had Eastern not routed Montana State last Thursday, 92-68.

"When it is a game that comes down to one possession like that, there are a lot of things you can look at," Eastern head coach Jim Hayford said.

Part of Eastern's downfall was a finish where they left a potential 12 points on the floor in the final 2 minutes, 15 seconds. Tyler Harvey's layup with 1:54 to play, which cut the Montana lead to 77-76, were the last points Eastern would score. The Eagles are now 13-2 at home this season.

Harvey would miss from 3-range, Venky Jois had a pair of layups fall out and Drew Brandon did the same. The Eagles had one final opportunity on a baseline jumper by Parker Kelly just inside the arc with four seconds to play, but it was an air ball and fell into the arms of Montana's Fabijan Krslovic.

"We executed a really good baseline out-of-bounds play and Drew hit Parker there in rhythm," Hayford said. "I asked Parker if he was fouled, and he said no. He missed it, but he got a wide-open look."

Montana was hardly better down the stretch with their final points coming with 2:35 to play, a basket by their leading scorer Martin Breunig to complete his 24-point day.

Harvey scored 27 to lead the Eagles, Brandon had 15 and Jois 10, plus 11 rebounds for his second double-double of the week.

Bigger, perhaps, in the loss was Eastern's uncharacteristic 12 of 20 day at the free throw line when the Grizzlies were a perfect 12 for 12. Eastern's 60 percent number at the line was well below its 73.4 percent for the season.

Trailing 42-39 at halftime and 45-39 in the opening 12 seconds of the second half,

Eastern went on a 11-2 run that gave the Eagles their biggest lead of the game, 56-51 with 13:48 to play. The teams traded mini-runs, and the lead, with Eastern leading 69-66 after three Harvey free throws with 6:33 to play.

Montana went on an 11-3 run in the next four minutes. In that span the Grzzlies got the lead for good, 71-69, on a Brandon Gfeller 3 with 5:31 remaining.

With the loss, Eastern dropped from 18th to 20th in this week's Collegeinsider.com Mid Major poll. The Grizzlies are 13-4 in Big Sky play, 17-11 overall and avenged a 75-69 loss to Eastern in Missoula.

Eastern reached a milestone 21st victory Thursday, a school record for NCAA Division I play and tied the school record for conference wins.

The Eagles, up 37-28 at the half, scored 24 of the next 30 points to open a 25-point lead with 13:29 to play. That included 13-0 run as the Eagles shutout the Bobcats for nearly four minutes. Eastern outscored MSU 55-40 in the second half.

"It looked a lot like the team I saw in early December and early January when we were clicking," Hayford said.

Jois score 27 to lead the Eagles and added 11 rebounds. Harvey added 20 and Ognjen Mijkovic another 15.

Now the Eagles, 12-4 in conference play and 21-8 overall, hit the road for their final two league games. They are at Idaho State (3-13, 6-22) tonight (March 5) and Weber State (7-9, 12-15) Saturday. With the right set of circumstances, Eastern harbors a remote chance at the regular season title, but a sweep of the final games is job No. 1.

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

 

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