Offense struggles in EWU women's loss at Idaho

Poor point production in the paint continues to plague the Eastern Washington women’s basketball team.

That, combined with one of their poorest field goal shooting percentages of the season, helped lead to a 71-58 loss Saturday, Jan. 31 to the University of Idaho at the Cowan Spectrum in Moscow.

The loss, Eastern’s fourth in a row, evened the Eagles’ record at 4-4 in Big Sky Conference play and 11-8 overall. Idaho is now 3-5 in league play, 9-10 overall.

“We play our best basketball when we share the ball and distribute,” EWU head coach Wendy Schuller said. “Our strength is having four or five players in double figures, and if you’re leading scorer has 14 but other players have 13, 12 or 11, that’s okay. We need to get back to playing that way and sharing the ball.”

After two weeks on the road, the Eagles are home at Reese Court to face league-leading Montana (8-1 Big Sky, 15-5 overall) Thursday, Feb. 5, at 6 p.m. and then Montana State (3-6, 9-11) Saturday at 2:05 p.m.

A shot from junior Hayley Hodgins put Eastern up two, 27-25, with 2 minutes, 25 seconds left in the first half, but the Vandals closed the half on a 5-0 run, including a buzzer-beating lay-up that gave the Vandals a 30-27 halftime lead.

Idaho carried that momentum into the second half. The Vandals reeled off an 8-0 run to start the final 20 minutes and led 38-27 with 17:14 remaining.

Despite their poor start offensively where the Eagles shot 2 of 14 in the opening minutes of the second half, Eastern continued to battle and trimmed Idaho’s lead to 51-48 on a Jade Redmon 3-point basket with 7:40 to play.

But that was it for the Eagles who would not score for the next three minutes and Idaho regained an 11-point lead that would never shrink.

“We would cut the lead down and then lose focus on that end of the floor,” Schuller said. “We need to get back to playing a complete 40-minute game.”

Hodgins led EWU with 22 points, knocking down three 3-pointers. Redmon was the only other Eagle in double figures with 11 points.

Eastern was held to just 35.6 percent shooting on the day, including 29 percent in the second half. Overall, it was the lowest since the Eagles shot 34.9 percent versus Georgia Southern Dec. 21 in a 55-42 EWU victory. Idaho shot 36.9 percent on the day.

Idaho finished with a 32-14 edge in points in the paint. The Vandals also dominated on the boards with a 50-34 edge, including 16-7 on the offensive end.

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