Bears leave Portland still looking for first win vs. Vikings
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PORTLAND, Ore. -- Northern Colorado men’s
basketball had four players score in double figures Friday night
against Portland State, but none of the Bears were truly ever able
to get in a groove in a frustrating 85-69 loss inside the
Vikings’ Peter W. Stott Center.
Senior Will Figures led the way for Northern Colorado (15-4, 4-2
Big Sky) with 12 points, junior Chris Kaba followed up with 11, and
Neal Kingman and Devon Beitzel had 10 apiece.
But, as a team, the Bears shot 39 percent from the floor (24-61)
-- only the fourth time all season they’ve come in below 40
percent -- and just 29 percent (6-21) from beyond the three-point
stripe to see their winning streak end at six games and their
winless streak against Portland State grow to 11 games, dating all
the way back to the 1974-75 season.
The Vikings (8-9, 3-2) outclassed Northern Colorado in almost
every category in this one, but their most glaring victory coming
on the glass. Portland State outrebounded the Bears 45-30 in the
victory, pushing Northern Colorado around like no other team has
done this season.
“That was the story of the game and something we talked
about at halftime,” Northern Colorado coach Tad Boyle said.
“It’s happened to us at times this year, but it’s
never happened to us over a 40-minute stretch. (The Vikings) punked
us, they manhandled us, they whipped our butt. They were the
tougher team tonight and they deserved to win.”
Portland State jumped ahead 12-2 just after the first media time
out and never trailed. Northern Colorado got to within one, 25-24,
with Montgomery’s jumper at the 8:10 mark of the first half
and was only down five at the break, thanks to some strong
free-throw shooting (7-9) and a team-high eight points from
Beitzel.
The Vikings put the game away early in the second half with a 16-5
run and led 58-42 with 12:46 to play after Melvin Jones, who led
Portland State with 18 points, connected on a 3-pointer.
Northern Colorado cut that margin down to eight with 8:10 to play,
but Portland State didn’t let it get any closer to hand the
Bears their worst loss in Portland since falling 77-52 to the
Vikings during the 1977-78 campaign.
“It’s gets down to guarding,” Boyle said.
“If you don’t guard, you don’t rebound, you
don’t have a chance to win the game. We were not good
tonight. They beat us in every sense. And as bad as it was, we cut
it to eight (with 8:10 to go), but from there we couldn’t get
stops.
“We didn’t play well offensively tonight, and
that’s disappointing because Portland State is one of those
teams that’s struggled in that area, and we didn’t make
them guard us. It’s just a bad outing for the Bears anyway
you look at it, and I wasn’t very good as a coach
tonight.”
Northern Colorado came into the game with a great chance to
silence some echoes from its past against the Vikings and earn a
heard-around-the-league statement victory in a gym that’s so
rarely seen the visiting team exit a winner. Portland State has now
won 13 straight home games and is 31-2 in the Stott Center since
the beginning of the 2007-08 season.
Now, Northern Colorado faces a quick turnaround against Eastern
Washington at 8:05 p.m. (MT) tomorrow night in Cheney, Wash. The
Bears will fly to Spokane tomorrow morning and then turn their
attention toward an Eagles club that fell tonight to Northern
Arizona at home.
Northern Colorado remains in the midst of one of its finest
seasons ever, but Boyle and his coaches and the players know they
haven’t really accomplished anything yet. They had the chance
to move a step toward accomplishment tonight in Portland, but it
didn’t happen.
“There are two types of teams this time of year: those that
are getting better and those that aren’t,” Boyle said.
“We want to be the former, not the latter.”