Maybe not elite, but Eastern Washington is no stranger to March basketball
Forward Tanner Groves hugs teammate Jack Perry after Eastern Washington knocked off Montana State to win the Big Sky Conference tournament title and automatic berth into this week's NCAA tournament.
Eagles head coach Shantay Legans cuts down the nets after winning the conference title in Boise, Idaho last Saturday.
CHENEY - NCAA March Madness will have a West Plains flavor this year.
By virtue of its win over Montana State last Saturday, Eastern Washington University will be making its third trip to the Big Dance - earning a Saturday matchup with one of the elites of men's basketball, Kansas. The Eagles and Jayhawks tangle at 10:15 a.m., location undisclosed at press time but somewhere in Indiana in a tournament restricted this year to just one state because of the coronavirus pandemic.
It's Eastern's third trip to the NCAA's, and 12 post-season appearance overall, stretching back the days when the school on Cheney's hill played under two different names and in a different division. And while it may not be as illustrious a post-season history as its larger neighbor down the road - particularly in the money spent on athletics - it's a history alums can point to and say at least they do belong on the national stage.
Eastern Washington's first national tournament experience came in March 1942 with a trip to the then-National Association of Intercollegiate Basketball (NAIB) tournament, the forerunner to what eventually became the NAIA, National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The then-Eastern Washington College of Education returned in 1943 and 1945-47, but it was the final two years of that latter run where they had the most success.
At the tournament in Kansas City, Mo., March 12-14, 1946, the team earned wins over Louisiana Tech, 66-44, and Southeastern Oklahoma, 45-37, 45-37 before losing to future West Coast Conference member and Gonzaga foe Pepperdine 46-42. The following March 11-13, EWCC knocked off Culver-Stockton 51-48 and Dakota Wesleyan 62-48 before bowing out against Marshall, 56-48.
As the Eagles, Eastern Washington earned a berth in the National Invitational Tournament in 2003, losing 78-71 to the University of Wyoming in Laramie.
Eastern's first NCAA tournament appearance came in the 2003-2004 season. Led by Brendon Merritt's 22 points, Eastern beat Northern Arizona71-59 on the hardwood at Reese Court to capture its first Big Sky title, earning a first-round tournament date with third-ranked, second-seeded Oklahoma State.
On March 19 in Kansas City, Mo., then-head coach Ray Giacoletti's Eagles led the Cowboys at halftime, but eventually ended up losing 75-56, led by 16 points from Gregg Smith, now a teacher and former boys head coach at Cheney High School.
Eastern's last trip to the Big Dance was under former head coach Jim Hayford. Tyler Harvey scored 18 points to lead the Eagles past Montana, 69-65, in Missoula for the Big Sky crown, and then scored 27 points as Eastern lost to No. 22 and fourth-seeded Georgetown, 84-74, in Portland, Ore.
The Eagles have played in three College Basketball Invitational (CBI) tournaments, 2016 – 2018. In the 2016 CBI, Eastern recorded its first win in a national postseason tournament as a member of Division I with a 79-72 home win over Pepperdine.
The Eagles are now 1-5 in postseason national tournaments as a member of NCAA Division I, and 7-10 overall.
Eastern is no stranger to playing basketball in Indiana, and in fact have some pleasant institutional memories of the experience. On Nov. 24, 2014, the Eagles ventured into Bloomington and pulled off what is probably the biggest upset, and victory, in school history by knocking off the Hoosiers of the Big 10, 88-86, snapping the nation's third-longest non-conference home winning streak of 43 games.
Whether that's mojo enough to help send the Eagles to a win over NCAA blue blood Kansas, only time will tell.
John McCallum can be reached at [email protected].
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