BOZEMAN, Mont. -- When it was time to be tough, the men in black responded.
Damian Lillard scored 25 points, including a pair of free throws with 3.4 seconds left to seal the game, and had eight rebounds as the Weber State Wildcats salvaged a split on the Montana road trip with a 75-71 win over Montana State on Saturday.
"Anytime you can get a split on this trip you'll take it and run," said WSU coach Randy Rahe.
The Wildcats (15-8, 9-2 Big Sky Conference), who rebounded from Friday's loss at Montana, had to fight off a determined Bobcat squad in the second half in order to get the win that keeps WSU alone in first place in the league standings. Montana State (12-11, 7-5 Big Sky), which trailed by as many as 13 points late in the first half, cut WSU's lead to 68-67 on a 3-pointer from Erik Rush with 3:41 left in the game.
The Wildcats went to one of their seniors and Steve Panos scored two straight baskets to give the Wildcats a bit of a cushion. However the Bobcats weren't done, and again cut the lead to one-point when Marquis Navarre scored two straight baskets to cut WSU's lead to 72-71 with 13 seconds remaining.
Narvaree finished with 16 points while Bobby Howard led the Bobcats with 25 points.
Kyle Bullinger, who finished with 10 points, hit the second of two free throws two seconds later to increase the lead.
"I was really upset for missing that first one, but we needed the second one and I was fortunate enough to make it," Bullinger said.
Narvaree got to the foul line with 4.1 seconds, but missed the first shot. He intentionally missed the second, but the shot failed to hit the rim and WSU gained possession.
That was when Lillard hit the game-sealing free throws and was finally able to respond to the crowd behind the WSU bench that had been hounding him all night long.
"Every time something went wrong for us they started calling me out on it," Lillard said. "I never said anything to them but I know those last free-throws iced the game for us so I felt like that was the time to turn and look at them."
Lillard hit a 3-pointer that gave WSU, which also got 11 points from Trevor Morris off the bench, a 31-18 lead with just less than five minutes remaining in the first half. The Wildcats took a 41-33 lead into the locker room after shooting close to 52 percents while holding the Bobcats to less than 35 percent.
"We were guarding our tails off," Rahe said. "That was our big emphasis. We were the aggressors and that led to easy baskets on the other end and that's our recipe for success."
Even after Franklin Session, who finished with 14 points, completed a three-point play to start the second half, Montana State quickly answered with a 7-0 run of their own and kept the game tight until the final minutes. With the Bobcats poised to take the lead throughout the rest of the half, the Wildcats needed to respond.
"Our guys got a little tougher, that's all they did," Rahe said. "They kept fighting and scratching and clawing."
Not only does the win, which completed the regular-season sweep over the Bobcats, show that the Wildcats can respond when they need to but it also proves a point that the Wildcats have been pointing at as a strength.
"One thing we always talk about is giving ourselves a chance down the stretch because we're going to win a close game," Rahe said.
The Wildcats are now 5-0 this season in games decided by four points or less.
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