EWU overcomes 17-point deficit, wins in overtime
With just over eight minutes left to play in last Saturday’s game against Eastern Washington, the Vandals had their biggest lead of 17 points and the cards looked to be in their favor.
Jay Anderson | Argonaut
Sophomore Gurad Sekou Wiggs drives to the basket during Idaho’s loss to Eastern Washington Saturday Jan 31 at Reese Court
Eastern Washington’s Tyler Harvey, who entered the game as the nations leading scorer, was out with an injury he suffered early in the second half. The Reese Court crowd, which had yet to see the Eagles lose at home this season, was silent and Vandal fans started to overpower the once hostile crowd.
The game seemed all but over. It wasn’t.
The Eagles (16-5, 7-1 Big Sky) rallied back and finished regulation with a 33-16 run, capped off by senior guard Drew Brandon sending the game to overtime with a layup at the final buzzer.
Eastern Washington carried the momentum into overtime and defeated Idaho, 98-95.
Jay Anderson | Argonaut
Senior point guard Mike Scott drives past a defender during Idaho’s 98-95 overtime loss to Eastern Washington Saturday in Cheney, Washington. Scott’s final shot was blocked by EWU as time expired in overtime.
Idaho coach Don Verlin said there wasn’t much he could have said to the team in the locker room after a tough loss like this.
“No one hurts more than them, no one works harder than them, no one knows the mistakes we made more than them,” he said. “Now is not the time to coach them … We need 24 to 48 hours to digest it. We’ll go back, watch the film, figure out how we can get better, get in this position again and we’ll win.”
With the loss, Idaho’s record falls to 8-11 overall and 3-5 in Big Sky competition. The Vandals are back on the road this week to play Montana State Thursday and Montana Saturday. Both games are on the road.
This wasn’t the first time Idaho failed to hold a significant lead this season. Verlin said the team can’t make a big deal out of it and needs to continue to improve and learn from those kinds of games.
“We gotta keep putting ourselves into those positions,” Verlin said of holding a big lead in games. “Give our guys credit, we came in here and played our tail off. We battled like crazy. We’re getting better, and that’s what I’m happy about.”
Jay Anderson | Argonaut
Sophomore Gurad Sekou Wiggs is blocked by Eastern’s Venky Jois during Saturday’s 98-95 loss to Eastern Washington.
Eastern Washington’s late game success was fueled by its full-court pressure defense, which caused the Vandals to turn the ball over four times in the final eight minutes of regulation.
Verlin said they weren’t fundamentally sound with the ball.
“Well we didn’t execute our press breaker — that was the bottom line,” he said. “I thought we had a couple of chances to attack in the press break, and we didn’t do it … I have some young guys out there and we didn’t respond like we needed to (in order) to win this game tonight.”
While Verlin was disappointed with the outcome, he’s excited about the future of Idaho’s rivalry with Eastern Washington.
“This was an awfully good rivalry game tonight,” he said. “Their crowd was into it and they were loud. It was a hell of a basketball game.”
Korbin McDonald can be reached at [email protected]