Bengals Play Hard But Fall at Eastern Washington

 
POCATELLO, Idaho- The Idaho State men's basketball team battled the No. 19 ranked mid-major team in country, Eastern Washington, tough before losing 65-57 on Saturday afternoon at Reese Court in Cheney, Washington.

"We were much more focused tonight," Idaho State coach Bill Evans said. "I know people in Southeastern Idaho would be proud with how our guys played today. They played good and really hard. They stayed within the game plan."

Eastern Washington improved to 11-4 overall and 2-0 in Big Sky play while ISU dropped to 3-11 and 0-2 in league.

Chris Hansen led all scorers with a game-high 23 points on seven-of-11 shooting from the field. He was a perfect five-for-five from the free throw line and he made four 3-pointers on six attempts.

"We got Chris going a bit tonight," Evans said.

Jeffrey Solarin had 14 points and a game-high 12 rebounds while Ben Wilson had a season-high 10 points. The Bengals out rebounded Eastern Washington 41-27 and came up with 20 offensive rebounds.

"Offensive rebounds is about toughness and effort," Evans said. "We did a great job in that area."

Idaho State shot 37.3 percent from the field and the Eagles shot 42.9 percent. ISU turned the ball over 16 times, with 10 turnovers coming in the second half.

Eastern Washington's biggest lead of the night was 10 points in the final minute but prior to that the Bengals had a chance to tie or take the lead after Hansen made a 3-pointer to cut the EWU lead to 55-53 with 4:55 remaining in the contest.

But in the final  minutes of the game ISU turned the ball over four times and was held to two points, allowing Eastern Washington to take a 63-53 lead with 1:04 left in the game.

ISU led for the first 12 minutes of the first half, building a 17-9 lead with 11:46 remaining in the half after Hansen converted a three-point play. The Eagles then went on a 15-0 run over a six minute span to take a 24-19 lead with six minutes left in the first period. Eastern Washington led 30-27 at halftime.

The Bengals took 35-34 lead before Eastern Washington took the lead for good at 37-35 on a Tyler Harvey 3-pointer. Harvey leads the Big Sky Conference in scoring at 24 points a game but he was held to 16 on four-of-12 shooting.  

Idaho State returns home to host Montana State on January 8 and Montana on January 10. Both games begin at 7 p.m. at ICCU Court in Holt Arena.

"We came up on the short end tonight but we have 16 games to go," Evans said. "My team is playing hard and with integrity."