Denim Millward
Sports Editor
If an old cliché were to be chosen to represent the 2013-2014 season for the ISU Men’s Basketball team, “close but no cigar” would be the clubhouse favorite.
Though a significant improvement from a disastrous 2012-2013 campaign, many feel the Bengals’ 11-18 overall record is not truly indicative of the improvement and significant strides the team made since the previous year.
The season for the men’s basketball team was starkly similar in many ways to the 2013 season for the ISU football team: both squads were coming off disastrous years, both were amalgamations of flashes of potential and growing pains and both had better years than their respective records indicated.
Completing the unique parallel is the fact that both head coaches, basketball coach Bill Evans and football coach Mike Kramer, were awarded with matching three-year contract extensions in the past few months, as was head volleyball coach Chad Teichert.
After the resoundingly successful season Kramer’s football team has enjoyed thus far in the season, Bengal basketball fans and coaches will be crossing all their fingers and toes that this parallel continues.
If Coach Evans’ squad hopes to replicate the success on the court that Coach Kramer’s team has had on the field, it will need to fill some serious voids left by departing seniors Tomas Sanchez and Andre Hatchett tout de suite.
The losses of Sanchez and Hatchett leave the Bengals without two of their three leading scorers from their previous season as well as their team leader in steals and assists in Sanchez. In addition to their statistical contributions, Hatchett and especially Sanchez were the vocal leaders of the team.
Among those who will be expected to both increase production and step into a leadership role is senior forward Jeffrey Solarin.
Despite being an undersized forward at 6’4,” the junior-college transfer made an enormous impact in his first season as a Bengal. Solarin averaged 10.4 points and 8.5 rebounds per-game in the 2013-2014 season, which included a rare 20/20 game in which Solarin scored 23 points and pulled down 20 rebounds in a game against North Dakota February 8.
After a year gaining valuable experience and proving he can significantly contribute to the team, the expectations for Solarin are undoubtedly high.
Also returning to the Bengals with high expectations is sharpshooting senior swingman Chris Hansen.
The three-point specialist, 2013-2014 leading scorer and Fort Collins, Colorado native can score in bunches, as evidenced by his performance last season when he scored a career high 33 points in an overtime upset win of San Francisco and scored in double digits for the Bengals in all but 3 games.
With Solarin and Hansen earmarked to lead Idaho State’s scoring attack, one particularly interesting variable with the Bengals for this upcoming season is if the scoring remains fairly evenly distributed, with four players averaging double figures in 2013-2014, or if Hansen and Solarin shoulder a larger percentage of that responsibility while the remainder of the team, who are either new to the team or didn’t significantly contribute to scoring last season, play more complimentary roles.
The Bengals have a number of fresh faces that will be making their Idaho State basketball debuts this season, either due to being brand new to the team or due to redshirting last year. Most of the new Bengals call places other than the United States home and add to the rich cultural diversity on the Idaho State roster.
Big men Andre Slavik and Novak Topalovic hail from Slovakia and Serbia, respectively.
After red-shirting last season, the Brisbane-born Ben Wilson will look to help fill the backcourt void left by the departing Hatchett and Sanchez.
Freshman guard Geno Luzcando played high school basketball at Wasatch Academy High School, but originally hails from Estacion Central, Chile.
The Bengals will attempt to utilize the varied mix of new players and returning veterans to get over the proverbial hump that gave them so much trouble last season.
Last season, the Bengals held the unenviable title of kings of the close loss.
Of the Bengals’ 18 total losses last season, 16 were single-digit losses, an almost impossibly high percentage. Seven of those losses were by less than four points, hence “close but no cigar” being the resounding theme of last season.
Theories abound as to what the cause of this almost-preposterous statistic was.
Whether it was due to the inability of the Bengals to perform in clutch situations, whether it was indicative of a lack of focus and discipline or whether it was nothing more than an exceedingly rare statistical anomaly, it’s one phenomenon that Bengal players and fans do not want to see repeated this season.
The Bengals kick off their season with an exhibition contest against Great Falls Thursday, Oct. 30 in Pocatello at 7:05 p.m.
