The Eastern Washington University men’s basketball team jumped out to a 27-2 lead and went on to beat Great Falls handily 103-76 in non-conference game Thursday, Dec. 8 at Reese Court.
The Eagles had a 59-percent to 47-percent shooting advantage over the Argos, a member of the Frontier Conference in the NAIA. The finals week romp followed five games Eastern won by a collective total of 24 points and featured five overtime periods.
Sophomore Ty Gibson scored 13 points in a less than four minute span in the first half and finished with a career-high 19 points. He led four players in double figures, including two-time Big Sky Conference Player of the Week Bogdan Bliznyuk with 18 points and four assists. True freshman Mason Peatling caught the eye of head coach Jim Hayford, finishing with five points, three assists and a pair of rebounds.
The victory was Eastern’s sixth in a row, with the first five won by six points or less. Now 7-2, Eastern becomes just the third team in EWU’s 34-year history as a member of NCAA Division I to have a 7-2 or better start, joining the 2014-15 NCAA Tournament team as the only squads to achieve that feat.
“I kind of thought before the game it would nice to have a more relaxed game,” EWU head coach Jim Hayford said. The Eagles were out-scored 54-52 in the second half, perhaps a littlle too relaxed. “We just lost some defensive intensity in the second half,” he added.
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