Dec. 21, 2009
Final Stats
Southern Utah Box Score 
Pocatello, ID--The Bengals headed into the Holidays with a sweet 61-48 victory over Southern Utah at Reed Gym Monday night with a solid defensive effort to hold the Thunderbirds to the fewest points by an opponent this season, 24 points in each half. Idaho State led the entire game and junior Chelsea Pickering led the Bengals with 14 points in 18 minutes before fouling out. Freshmen Ashleigh Vella and Brea Matthews recorded career-highs in their first double-figure performances of the season. Idaho State improved to 4-8 for the season extending its home winning streak to three. Southern Utah fell to 3-9 for the season.
"I was pleased, they were focused and played hard," said Head Coach Sobolewski about the player's response for the potential to mentally check-out early for the holiday break. "We stuck to the game plan and we put a couple of new things in defensively that they did well with so I think they responded well to the test of the trap game. We played aggressively in the half court and full court."
Pickering hit 5-of-8 from the field and 2-of-3 from the arc as well as sinking both of her free throw attempts before fouling out. She also led the Bengals in steals with five, a game and career-high, helping ISU pick the pockets of the Thunderbirds 13 times to SUU's five. Idaho State recorded 29 points off of turnovers while Southern Utah posted eight.
Redshirt Junior Andrea Blodgett who saw her first appearance for Idaho State recorded three steals. Blodgett became academically eligible hours before the game started after transfer of credit issues held her off the court last season. Blodgett recorded four points from her three attempts.
"The two shots she hit were very timely. We were sputtering a bit and Southern Utah was hitting a couple shots and she responded," said Sobolewski of Blodgett's first Division I game. "She's a good player. She can defensively pressure the ball and she can shoot the three... It's nice to have another ball handler and to have another person you can put out there that even though she's small, she's so scrappy defensively she can cause problems."
ISU confirmed that it had depth even among its youngest players as freshmen Vella and Matthews recorded career-highs in their first double-figure performances of the season with Vella posting 13 points in 30 minutes before fouling out while Matthews chipped in 10 points in 17 minutes.
Both Pickering and Matthews went 2-for-3 from the arc helping Idaho State hit 7-of-13 from the arc for the night to give ISU a 53.8 percent accuracy. ISU shot 42.6 percent from the field and held Southern Utah to 32.7 percent for the game.
It took the Bengals a few minutes to pick up offensive steam, but with six minutes remaining in the first half the Bengals jumped out to a 21-9 lead off a Matthews Jumper. The Thunderbirds would go on a 13-8 run closing the gap to a five point deficit into the break down 29-24, but that would be as close as they would get.
The Bengals opened the second half with a 20-4 run to hold ISU's largest lead of the game, 21-points, at the 9:45 mark off her only trey of the game by senior Andrea Videbeck who recorded nine points in the match up. In the 20-4 run Pickering recorded eight points and three steals.
Though Southern Utah was able to work the lead down a bit the Bengals recorded its second 13-plus margin victory of the season when the buzzer went off. The Thunderbirds were led by Chanel Thorley who recorded nine points and nine rebounds. Challis Pascucci chipped in seven points, but her main focus was rebounding as the forward pulled down 14 boards, she was one rebound shy of tying her career-high.
Idaho State will have a few days off to enjoy the holiday break before returning home to host Great Falls on Tuesday, December 29 at Reed Gym. Tip-off begins at 7:05 p.m.
"We talked about staying in shape and not doing anything silly like playing a pick-up game where they could get hurt," said Sobolewski. "We also talked about getting away from basketball a little bit and having fun with their families, but staying focused. We want to go 5-8 heading into conference."
