Eastern Washington extends win streak, too hot for Weber State in 89-82 decision
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- Weber State guard Steven Verplancken Jr. (11) drives against Eastern Washington’s Angelo Allegri (13) on Thursday, Feb. 23, 2023, at the Dee Events Center in Ogden.
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- Weber State center Handje Tamba (32) rises to shoot against Eastern Washington on Thursday, Feb. 23, 2023, at the Dee Events Center in Ogden.
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- Weber State’s Dillon Jones, center, drives past Eastern Washington’s Cedric Coward (0) on Thursday, Feb. 23, 2023, at the Dee Events Center in Ogden.
OGDEN — Weber State men’s basketball had a clear plan Thursday night to at least attempt to disrupt Eastern Washington, holders of the nation’s longest active winning streak and an unbeaten conference record.
The Wildcats played center Ethan Price with a wing defender, leaving center Alex Tew and others to range off EWU forward Casey Jones to double in the post and disrupt Eastern’s offensive flow.
To some degree, it worked. The look created several turnovers in the first half and also kept Steele Venters and Angelo Allegri at bay for a time.
But Jones rose to the occasion and, after a first half when both teams made nearly everything, the offensively gifted Eagles kept making it rain and Weber State did not. Eastern Washington outlasted the Wildcats 89-82 to run its winning streak to 18 games.
“They’re a very, very good basketball team and put you in a lot of difficult situations defensively,” WSU head coach Eric Duft said. “I thought (our plan) threw them off a little bit in the first half … to their credit, Casey Jones steps up, goes 3 for 7 from 3.
“I thought defensively our plan was solid … their shotmaking ability was on display.”
With a career-high 25 points, Jones became Eastern’s sixth player to score 20 or more points against a Big Sky opponent.
“They kind of messed with him early but he figured it out,” EWU head coach David Riley said.
The Eagles (22-7, 16-0 Big Sky) won the regular-season title outright by shooting 13 of 23 from deep.
Weber State (15-14, 10-6) shot 8 of 16 from the 3-point line in the first half and led nearly the entire frame, but only by a small margin. The Wildcats took a 43-41 lead into the locker room on a high-arcing, stepback jumper from Dillon Jones.
Dillon Jones finished with 21 points, nine rebounds and five assists, moving him past Zach Braxton and into fifth place on WSU’s all-time career rebounds list with 787.
But, while WSU shot 0 of 10 from deep in the second half, EWU kept going. After Dillon Jones opened the half with a hammer dunk driving down the lane, Casey Jones opened his team’s scoring in the frame the same way he did in the first half: with a 3-pointer.
Casey Jones, who had made 14 3-pointers all season, knocked down three Thursday, shot 7 of 12 overall and was 8 of 9 at the foul line. He scored at the rim on several drives and generally could not be stopped on his way to his career mark.
Tyreese Davis rattled home a stepback 3 to finish a 12-0 EWU run for a 53-45 lead early in the second half and, though Weber was never all the way out of it, it was never quite all the way in the game from there either.
“We found a way to get stops in the second half,” Riley said. “Weber played an incredible half offensively and hats off to them … we did a better job (in the second half), they also missed some shots so we got lucky … offensively, our guys did a great job playing together and defensively, we played one half which was enough.”
Venters and Allegri continued to be tough-to-guard shotmakers. Though their effects were limited in the first half, they each hit a 3 on consecutive possessions to turn a 39-35 Weber lead into a 41-41 knot before Dillon Jones gave WSU the lead at halftime.
Venters made three more 3-pointers in the second half, all seemingly at crucial moments, and Allegri finished 3 of 4 from downtown. Venters scored 18 points and Allegri 15, with Davis pitching in 10.
Weber State’s last gasp came with just more than 5 minutes left when Venters undercut Tew on an attempted alley-oop pass. The play wasn’t intentionally malicious but was dangerous by definition, so Tew took and made two flagrant free throws to cut EWU’s lead to 71-66.
But the ensuing possession was sloppy and ended with Dillon Jones being blocked on a 3-point attempt late in the shot clock, then committing a foul trying to deflect a backcourt pass. Casey Jones converted his free throws the other way; instead of a three- or two-point game, the deficit was back to seven.
With two 3-pointers and a flurry of buckets at the rim — including a two-handed flush over EWU big man Dane Erikstrup — WSU wing Dyson Koehler finished with a career-high 16 points while adding five rebounds. Zahir Porter totaled 14 points, with 11 coming in the second half. Steven Verplancken Jr. added 12 points and Tew pitched in eight points and eight rebounds.
Weber State regroups for senior night, welcoming Idaho (10-19, 4-12) to Ogden at 7 p.m. Saturday. Porter and Junior Ballard are WSU’s two seniors to be honored.
Montana State eked out a home win Thursday over Sacramento State, clinching second place. With one more win or one more Montana loss, Weber State can clinch third place.
The Wildcats feel they’ve been Eastern Washington’s toughest matchup in league play after a four-point road loss and Thursday’s contest, which were the two best field-goal-shooting performances against the Eagles in conference play.
“We can’t take this loss to heart too much because we were playing hard out there. It’s not like we were giving up,” Koehler said. “In basketball, you have to have a short memory. It’s a loss, then we have to play in two days. We’re not worried too much. We have to look at what we did wrong, what we did right, and take it into the next game.”
Dillon Jones called back to comments he’s made throughout the season about keeping a foundation despite losses, something that helped WSU turn around a 2-7 start to a likely third-place finish in league play.
“You don’t just scrap the foundation just because you lost a game. It’s just a part of it. We’ve just got to stay true to who we are … it’s important early on in the season to build a foundation so you can bounce back quicker … we’re not about to scrape it clean, we’re ready to bounce back.”
EWU 64, WSU 31
Weber State women’s basketball scored the second-fewest points in a single game in program history on the way to a lopsided road loss at Eastern Washington.
Weber State (6-22, 2-14 Big Sky) got 12 points and seven rebounds from Jadyn Matthews; she shot 5 of 12 (41.7%) from the field, everyone else was 7 of 42 (16.7%). The Wildcats shot 0 of 14 from the 3-point line.
The loss assures WSU of a last-place finish ahead of the conference tournament.