Idaho couldn’t capitalize on an early seven-point lead, as Montana closed out the first half with a 25-10 run to take an eight-point lead at halftime. The Grizzlies would never trail again, and won the game 70-56 over the Vandals.
Idaho coach Don Verlin said early foul troubled caused problems for the Vandals.
“Montana took it to us, and they were more physical than we were,” he said. “The early foul trouble really hurt us. We were out there with some odd lineups and we weren’t nearly as good as we should have been offensively.”
With the loss Idaho falls to 9-12 on the season and 4-6 in Big Sky competition. After spending the last three games on the road, the Vandals return home Feb. 12 for a game against Portland State — a team that beat them earlier in the season.
The Vandals turned the ball over 17 times against the Grizzlies, and Verlin blames the different lineups as the main reason for the sloppy play on offense.
“We turned the ball over way too much tonight,” Verlin said. “A lot of those because I didn’t have very good lineups in there. It’s probably as much my fault, but we were in foul trouble … we just couldn’t get any continuity in this basketball game.”
Senior shooting guard Connor Hill led the Vandals with 15 points on three 3-pointers and 4-of-5 shooting overall. Freshman forward Arkadiy Mkrtychyan, continued to provide a lift off the bench as he finished with 11 points and two rebounds.
Montana had four players score in double figures and were led by senior guard Jordan Gregory, who finished with 17 points, seven assists and three rebounds.
Verlin said the team would have been happy with two wins on the three-game road trip. However, with just one win over Montana State, he said the Vandals need to protect their home court with four of the last eight games played at home.
“We’re not as far away as we think,” Verlin said. “Our goal right now is to win our next game. Portland State coming in, we gotta do everything we can. We got to take care of our home court, we got to get on the road and get a few wins, get ourselves into that conference tournament and make a run like we did last year.”
sportsisfun
This game was a tough loss for the Vandals and it provided the team with an opportunity to see what happens when they allow another team to dominate them physically. I look forward to the team responding well and getting a victory on Feb 26th.