Eastern earns third NCAA Tournament trip

BOISE, Idaho — Combine three solid defensive efforts with offense in just the right doses and Eastern Washington emerged from the Idaho Central Arena in Boise as the 2021 Big Sky Conference men’s basketball champions, earning a berth in the NCAA Tournament.

In just its third trip to the national championship tournament in school history, Eastern faces the University of Kansas, March 20 in Indianapolis where, because of COVID-19, all games will be played at various venues in the city and surrounding area.

The No. 2 seeded Eagles capped off their league tournament run with a 65-55 win March 13 over surprise finalist Montana State. The No. 5 seeded Bobcats were upset winners over No. 1 seed Southern Utah in reaching the title game.

“We had to play one of our best defensive games to win this one,” head coach Shantay Legans said.

And on the flip side for a team that had routinely been scoring regularly in the 80s and 90s throughout the Big Sky regular season.

“They did a good job of slowing us down,’ Legans said. “We were ready to go and excited for the moment (and) our team took full advantage of what they needed to do.”

Eastern earned their third shot at a conference title with wins March 10 over No. 10 Northern Arizona 66-60 and then for the third time this season administered a solid beating on Montana, 78-50, to reach the title game.

A year ago Eastern won the Big Sky regular season title with a 16-4 record and were the favorites win the league tourney. But the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic ceased the season just a few hours prior to EWU taking the court for its Big Sky Tournament quarterfinal on March 12, 2020.

In the championship game Eastern jumped out to a 20-point first-half lead. And while seeing that margin shrink, the closest MSU got was 51-41 with 9 minutes, 19 seconds to play. Four-straight free throws by Tyler Robertson, however, helped put the game away.

Jacob Groves led the Eagles with 15 points, followed by brother Tanner Groves who had a double-double with 14 points and 14 rebounds. Michael Meadows added 12 points while Kim Aiken Jr. was a point shy of a double-double, scoring nine and grabbing 10 rebounds.

Tanner Groves, the league MVP during the regular season, was named the tournament MVP as well. He was joined on the All-Tournament team by Jacob Groves.

Friday’s game against Montana, who Eastern had faced — and lost to — in back-to-back conference tournament championship games in 2018 and 2019 certainly had to be immensely satisfying.

Eastern had runs of 11-0 and 17-0 in the first half, opened up a 29-point lead at halftime and led 44-15 after the first 20 minutes.

“Our team was ready and prepared to play,” Legans said. “Montana played tough and did everything they could to try to slow us down a bit, but our guys made some shots tonight and we played very good defense.”

Once again it was the brother show of sophomore Jacob Groves with a career-high 21 points, followed by junior Tanner’s 18.

In Thursday’s tournament opener vs. NAU a slow start transitioned as the half unfolded.

In the early-going, Eastern had more turnovers (6) than shots (5), but the Lumberjacks were equally tepid with a 2-of-10 shooting start. Eastern also struggled with a 2-of-9 shooting and fell behind 10-5 before hitting a pair of shots to knot the game at 10. 

That was part of a 10-2 Eagle spurt that put them up by three at the 8:48 mark. Eastern enjoyed an 8-of-9 shooting stretch and opened a 29-19 lead with 5:14 left on a 3-pointer by Jacob Davison, capping a run of eight-straight points.

“It was our first tournament game in two years and there may have been some nerves involved,” Legans said afterwards.

Robertson, the Big Sky’s Top Reserve player, had a game-high 18 for Eastern. Tanner Groves added 15 points and 11 and Kim Aiken Jr., a first team All-Big Sky selection, had 12 points, including four 3-pointers while Michael Meadows had 11.

Eastern is now 16-7 overall after finishing 12-3 and second place in conference play.

The Eagles, who are making their second trip to the tournament since 2015, have serious momentum heading into their matchup with the Jayhawks who are regulars in “March Madness.” Eastern has won 13 of their last 14 games and had won nine-straight before falling to Idaho State 68-63 on March 3.

Paul Delaney is a retired former Free Press Publishing reporter and can be reached at [email protected].