After countless lead changes, the Idaho men’s basketball team lost out on a close battle Tuesday night in Memorial Gymnasium 83-80.
Freshman guard Cameron Tyson proved nearly unstoppable in the second half, finishing the game shooting 6-9 from the 3-point range.
A trey with just over 30 seconds left in the game put Idaho within a point of a tie. He hit another critical 3-pointer that put Idaho within two points with 0.2 seconds left. Tyson put up 22 total points and finished as the Vandals’ leading scorer.
Idaho Head Coach Don Verlin, who leads a team without many of last year’s seniors, said he sees promise in Tyson’s big night. Tyson, meanwhile, said his breakout performance in his young career was just business as usual.
“I just got hot and my team just kept handing me the ball,” Tyson said. “I figured I had to shoot it, it was only right.”
The Nicholls State Colonels, who played their second consecutive game on the Palouse after a 89-72 loss against Washington State Sunday, defensively swarmed nearly every other Vandal player, holding senior guard Trevon Allen to six points and a single basket from the arc.
As a team, the Vandals shot 32-63, with 8-23 from downtown. Idaho dominated the rebound game, snagging 42 compared to the Colonel’s 25.
Verlin said his team’s physicality, especially when fighting for the offensive boards, kept the Vandals within reach of their first victory.
However, the Colonel offense outperformed the Silver and Gold just enough to steal the win in Moscow, shooting with 42.9 percent efficiency from the arc. According to Tyson, the defensive missteps were what kept Idaho from notching its first “W” of the year.
“The defense is something we have to pick up on,” he said. “(Guard Jeremiah Jefferson) kind of got going and we didn’t really have no answer for him for a minute, so he kind of killed us.”
The Vandals have now dropped three straight to open the season, and will look to get back on track during the Vandal Holiday Hoops Showcase in Moscow and Boise.
“We just got to keep grinding and find a way to sustain our intensity, sustain our togetherness a little bit longer,” Verlin said.
Brandon Hill can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @brandonmtnhill