Denim Millward
Sports Editor
A furious, frenetic comeback attempt led by senior point guard Tomas Sanchez and his backcourt running mate Chris Hansen fell short as the Bengals lost to the Montana Grizzlies 62-61 on Saturday, Feb. 22.
The loss was yet another instance of Head Coach Bill Evans’ squad being on the losing end of a close away game. The Bengals found themselves down 61-53 with a scant 3:38 to go in the game when the comeback began to mount. Sanchez drilled a three-point shot, which was followed by a Hansen layup that slashed the deficit to three, 61-58. The Bengals defense held tough, and Hansen made two clutch free throws to put ISU within a single point with less than a minute remaining in the game. After Montana went one-for-two from the charity stripe with 26 seconds left, the Bengals caught a break when Andre Hatchett was fouled with one second left. After Hatchett calmly sank the first free throw, the second rimmed out. The rebound was quickly corralled by a Grizzly, and the Bengals had to deal with the bitter taste of a close defeat yet again.
Astoundingly, every conference loss for the Bengals has come by seven points or less. The Bengals’ narrow defeat in Missoula was preceded by a six-point loss to Montana State in Bozeman just two days prior. Despite the end result, Evans was proud of his team. “We got stops and made baskets,” Evans said to the ISU Sports Information Department. “That is what it is about. Our guys were willing to step up and make big plays.”
Sanchez led all scorers with 17 points, chipped in three assists, and played all 40 minutes of the contest, continuing to rack up total minutes played at an astounding rate. Hatchett contributed 13 points and five boards. He was 9-12 from the free throw line, one of those misses being the potential game-tying shot. Hansen had 13 points and four assists, and Jeff Solarin was one rebound short of another double-double, tallying 10 points and nine rebounds.
Though the loss drops the Bengals to 10th place in the 11-team Big Sky Conference, ISU’s hopes of making the Big Sky Conference tournament are still alive, thanks to a highly unusual, almost unprecedented logjam in the middle of the conference. Currently, ISU has a 7-9 conference record, and a scant two games separates the 10th-place Bengals from the third-place Montana Grizzlies.
This unusual cluster of teams in the middle of the conference makes each game that much more critical, and subsequently makes each narrow loss by the Bengas that much more painful. The last four games of the season, the final two of which are on the road, and all of which are against teams ahead of Idaho State in the Big Sky Conference standings, will each be must-win games for the Bengals. If the Bengals can manage to shake off their road woes and finish the season on a four-game winning streak, it should secure them a spot in the Big Sky Conference Championship Tournament.
Only the top seven teams in the Big Sky Conference will advance to the tournament, and the unprecedented parity of the conference means there are numerous possibilities and scenarios to consider. Once tiebreakers come into play, which they almost inevitably will, the situation becomes even more of a confusing mess to hash out. But that’s not something the Bengals can worry about right now. If they want any shot at playing past their final four regular season games, they need to find a way to win close games on the road, instead of putting up a valiant effort that comes up just short.
The men’s basketball team will be back in action for the first of its final four games Thursday, Feb. 27 against the Northern Arizona Lumberjacks at 7 p.m. in Holt Arena. Two days later, the Bengals will play their final home game of the season against Sacramento State at 7 p.m. March 6, the Bengals travel to Cheney, Wash., to square off against Eastern Washington. They’ll head over to Portland, Ore., March 8 to close out the season against the Vikings.
