In tale of two halves, Weber State basketball’s rally short a couple buckets in 69-66 loss at Portland State
-
- Portland State’s Isaiah Johnson (22) shoots over Weber State’s Steven Verplancken Jr. (11) on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024, in Portland, Ore.
-
- Weber State’s Alex Tew dunks against Portland State on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024, in Portland, Ore.
Players and coaches say basketball is a game of runs.
What played out Saturday evening in Portland was one of the most extreme examples of the saying, one that’s true enough to not be cliché.
Homestanding Portland State wowed the crowd of just above zero fans (including Trail Blazers player Shaedon Sharpe, as campus was closed for snowy weather) to a 44-13 run that appeared to put the game away with 18:09 left in what looked like one of the more embarrassing losses a good Weber State team has ever taken.
But the Wildcats responded, scratching their way to a 40-17 run of their own.
In the end, however, Weber State missed too many shots after numerous defensive stops, star Dillon Jones missed a 3 at the buzzer and Portland State survived with a 69-66 home victory.
The lessons are plentiful for the Wildcats, who slammed into a wall in two road losses this week after six straight wins that included two conference victories of 20-plus points and ending the nation’s longest home winning streak at Oral Roberts.
“We’ve got smart players. We’re skilled. We’re kind of an even-keeled bunch,” Duft said. “But we’ve got to put a little more passion and we’ve got to play with a little more energy … Louie Jordan played 2 minutes and 56 seconds tonight but his energy, his passion, his ability to lift up his teammates … we’re going to go with guys who do those things.
“Dillon took some strides tonight with his leadership. It was not going well, he was missing layups … and he just hung in there and kept playing, kept leading, and that’s positive. We’re going to take that and run with it.”
Dyson Koehler again reset his career scoring high, totaling 21 points on 6-of-9 shooting and adding five rebounds to lead Weber State (11-6, 2-2 Big Sky). Jones finished with 20 points, seven rebounds and five assists.
The game started with a mini-run, too. Weber State made its first six shots and led 13-6 just three minutes in. WSU big man Alex Tew, who missed Thursday’s game at Sacramento State due to illness, joined the team in Portland and scored six of those 13 on assists from Blaise Threatt: a lob layup, a lob dunk and a score in the post.
Tew finished the game with 12 points on 5-of-8 shooting.
But then the trouble started. After 13 points in the first 3:20 of game time, Weber managed just 13 more over the next 18:31 of expired clock — and the reasons compounded each other.
After the 6-of-6 start, WSU made 5 of its next 23 shots, including a strange dichotomy of grabbing a total of 11 offensive rebounds in the game for only four second-chance points. In between those missed shots were eight giveaways, and every single one of them was a live-ball turnover and most of those led immediately to points.
Jones briefly blipped a 16-2 PSU run with a 3-pointer but the Vikings ended the first half making three straight 3s — two from Bobby Harvey, one from Jorell Saterfield, who each confidently toed the line with WSU seemingly in shambles.
That gave Portland State a 42-26 lead at halftime, including 20 fastbreak points and 14 points off turnovers.
“We only had 10 turnovers but they were costly ones,” Duft said. “That’s stuff we can fix. As far as the passion, the energy, that stuff we’re going to be aware of and guys that have that are going to be the guys to play.”
It somehow got worse: Ismail Habib and Saterfield again hit 3s right out of halftime to balloon the lead to 50-26, drawing a Weber State timeout with 18:09 left.
Bit by bit, the Wildcats somehow got back in it. First, a 9-0 run. Then, a 13-0 rally with 3-pointers from Koehler, Jones and Viljami Vartiainen. Jones scored nine of those 22 and Weber State had the game back to single digits at 59-50 with 9:40 left.
“I don’t know how many layups we missed tonight,” Duft lamented about what official stats say was a 12-of-27 night on layups. “Dillon had a lot of shots in the basket and we had open 3s and just couldn’t buy one, but the fight, the energy, the passion those guys played with the last 16 minutes — if we have that, we’re going to be very, very difficult in our conference.”
Two minutes later, Tew dunked on a Jones pass and Jones drove for a bucket, getting the deficit back to nine points at 63-54 with 7:33 remaining.
From that point, the Wildcats had at least nine more defensive stops that led to missed WSU field-goal attempts, the rally continuing on a slow flurry instead of the needed avalanche.
But the stops kept coming, as WSU held Portland State to 7 of 29 from the field and forced eight Vikings turnovers in the final 18 minutes.
Isiah Kirby, averaging 3.9 points per game off the bench this season, all but won the game for Portland State. He scored his team’s final two field goals on consecutive possessions — a tough, fadeaway 15-footer to beat the shot clock, and a driving score to make the game 67-55 with 5:45 left.
Kirby finished with 14 points on 7-of-8 shooting and those two buckets were just enough, despite the Vikings going without a field goal for the rest of the game.
WSU’s final 11-0 run included a Koehler 3, a Jones transition layup and another Tew dunk dished from Jones. Koehler made a pair of free throws with 23.7 seconds left to make the score 67-66 after Threatt picked Habib’s pocket for a steal.
Unable to force one more turnover, WSU fouled twice to put Portland State in the bonus. Saterfield made both his free takes with 13.3 seconds left, leading to WSU’s final possession that resulted in Jones’ missed 3-pointer.
“I don’t know that I’ve ever been part of a game you’re down 24 and keep missing — I don’t know how we did it — kept missing shots but kept getting back into it,” Duft said. “We had a chance to hit a couple dagger 3s and just kept missing, so I’m going to take away some positives, too. We’re going to keep going forward and I think we’ll be a better team because of it.”
As it has all season, Portland State (11-6, 2-2) got balanced scoring from Kirby’s 14, Saterfield and KJ Allen scoring 13 each, and Harvey totaling 12 points. All of Harvey’s 12 points came on four first-half 3-pointers; WSU held Saterfield, Allen and Harvey to 4-of-18 shooting in the second half.
Weber State returns home for two games, starting with league-leading Eastern Washington (9-7, 3-0) on Thursday. The Eagles broke open a close game at Idaho and ran away in the final 10 minutes for a 79-58 victory Saturday.