Taylor Meeks
Sports Editor
The Idaho State University men’s basketball team hoped to break its losing streak with two home matches last weekend inside Reed Gymnasium as they hosted Northern Arizona University Thursday night and Sacramento State Saturday night.
Unfortunately, the Bengals continued to suffer the seemingly unbreakable bad luck as they went 0-2 to extend the losing streak to eight straight games.
“Obviously we’re down, but we’ve got to keep fighting,” said point guard Tarik Cool. “Hopefully we’ll get the monkey off our back. We’ve got to turn it into a positive mindset and understand that we’ve been in these situations before, so we’ve got to learn from them.”
Thursday night’s game against NAU started with both teams battling point-for-point in the first ten minutes of the game. ISU took a small seven-point lead with 9:58 to go in the half, but just as quickly as the Bengals gained the momentum, it slipped away as the Lumberjacks climbed to a 38-35 advantage to close out the first half.
As the second half got underway, NAU extended its lead to 13 points with just over 13 minutes to play. After head coach Ryan Looney made a few substitutions, Idaho State went up by two points.
The last 30 seconds of regulation consisted of free throws by either team. The Bengals had three players go to the line but were unable to capitalize. After a missed free throw by Austin Smellie that would have secured the win for the Bengals, NAU’s Cameron Shelton made a full court drive for a layup at the buzzer to send the game to overtime.
After three turnovers, allowing Northern Arizona to go four of eight in the extra five minutes and giving its opponent 52 points in the paint over the course of the game, Idaho State was dealt a devastating 88-87 loss.
“It feels a lot like all the rest of them recently,” Looney said. “There’s been a number of games this year where we’ve given ourselves an opportunity to win at the end of regulation, and for whatever reason, aren’t getting it done.”
The Bengals returned Saturday night to face off with Sacramento State, but the game proved to be the same story, a different night as the team lost another close one, 63-59.
In the first ten minutes of the game, it appeared the Bengals were going to break a then seven game losing streak as they caught an early 19-9 lead over Sac State. However, after a bad run of repeated missed shots, the Hornets were able to inch ahead by three points to end the half.
Idaho State led for most of the first half, but the Hornets closed the period on a 12-2 run to take a 27-24 lead at the break.
The second half was a nail-biter as the score difference never exceeded six points. The Bengals were able to tie the Hornets four separate times but only managed to take a one-point lead before Sac State was back on top.
Idaho State shot 44 percent from the field (24-54), 23 percent from the three-point line (3-13) and only 61.5 percent from the free throw line (8-13). Sac State outrebounded the Bengals 36-30 and only had seven turnovers to ISU’s nine.
“One missed free throw for us right now is a really big deal,” Looney said. “One missed block out, one guy not going to the offensive glass, throwing the ball out of bounds one time is a really big deal. We’ve said it seven times so far this year, we’ve been in a one basket game and came out on the wrong end.”
Sac State (12-10 overall, 5-8 Big Sky) was perfect from the free throw line going six of six. Two of those freebies came in the final seconds of the game by Brandon Davis to push the score from 61-59 to 63-59 with two seconds left.
In the last 90 seconds, the Bengals were down by five points at two different times and managed to cut the deficit to one possession both times. But back-to-back jumpers by Sac State kept the lead out of ISU’s reach.
The Bengals only led one time in the second half after Malik Porter completed a three-point play to give ISU a 34-33 lead with 16:34 remaining. The momentum was short-lived after Izayah Mauriohooho-Le’afa got it back for Sac State with a 3-pointer 25 seconds later.
“The truth is, some of the areas where we are struggling are habit situations,” Looney said. “You’re never going to be a great block-out team defensively if you are not attempting to create that habit every single day. You’re never going to give great effort on the offensive glass every possession if you don’t really try to give that effort every single day.”
ISU is now 1-13 this season when trailing at halftime.
Porter led Idaho State with a career-high 31 points on 12-of-22 shooting, adding a team-best seven rebounds. Chier Maker and Jared Stutzman were ISU’s next-leading scorers with eight points apiece.
The Bengals are back on the road this week starting Thursday, Feb. 13 when they travel to Montana State and then Saturday, Feb. 15 at University of Montana.
“We are obviously going through a rough stretch right now,” Looney said. “We know we have bright days ahead of us, hopefully still this season. There’s just so many minor details that we need to be better at to win some of these close ones, but we haven’t been able to figure that out.”
