Deadeye Nau Puts Ewu Out Lumberjacks Target Eagles In Big Sky Semifinal Win

A little sympathy might have been in order.

Eastern Washington was, after all, coming off last Saturday’s emotionally painful home loss to Montana that had cost them an outright conference championship and a chance to host the Big Sky Conference tournament. But instead of offering any kind of condolences during Friday night’s Big Sky basketball semifinals showdown, third-seeded Northern Arizona played the role of heartless bully by raining down even more abuse on the second-seeded Eagles’ fragile psyche.

The Lumberjacks (19-10), who came in having won 11 of their last 12 regular-season games, sprinted to an early lead by banging home their first 12 shots and coasted to an easy 82-65 victory at Dahlberg Arena.

Ross Land, the best 3-point shooter in NCAA history, scored 24 points and Cory Schwab, who averaged just over nine points a game during the regular season, added 20 as the Lumberjacks pushed their way into the Big Sky title game for the third time in four seasons.

NAU and Cal State Northridge, a 76-65 semifinal winner over Montana, will decide the championship and the automatic NCAA berth that goes with it tonight at 7:35 PST.

The game will be televised live on ESPN2, but Eastern (15-12), after sharing the regular-season title with Montana, will have to watch it from Cheney after failing for the third straight year to advance in the tournament.

Just how much the Eagles were damaged by last Saturday’s devastating loss to Montana was impossible to gauge. They came out playing hard, but it’s nearly impossible to keep your chin up in the face of such torrid shooting.

NAU went more than 9-1/2 minutes before missing its first shot and by then, Eastern was trying to dig out of a 28-15 hole. Land, who has an NCAA-record 3-point shooting percentage above 46 percent, made two of his six 3-pointers and scored eight points during that early run.

“We shot the ball really well to- night,” NAU coach Mike Adras said almost sheepishly. “That’s probably a real understatement, but `Recruit to Shoot’ is what we talk about with NAU basketball.

“I expect nights like this, believe it or not.”

The Lumberjacks finished the game shooting 61.2 percent (30 for 49) from the field and 54.5 percent (12 for 22) from 3-point range. They also missed only 1 of 11 free throws and outrebounded the Eagles 40-33.

“Northern Arizona played an outstanding game tonight,” EWU coach Steve Aggers said. “I thought they shot the ball extremely well, and we had a very poor performance defensively.

“If you go underneath screens against Ross Land and Cory Schwab, they will burn you.”

Considering its brilliant start, NAU’s halftime lead of 42-32 wasn’t as comfortable as it could have been.

Eastern used the inside power of Chris White, who scored 10 of his 14 points in the first half, to withstand the Lumberjacks’ 21-9 run to open the game. They cut the deficit to 36-29 on a Dennis Fitzgerald free throw with 2:04 left in the period and then countered a late 3-pointer by Adam Lopez with a steal and a 28-foot halftime buzzer-beater by senior point guard Deon Williams.

Eastern opened the second half with a 3-point play by Kareem Hunter and seemed poised to make a serious run. The Eagles closed to within five points at 47-42 on a steal and baseline jumper by Hunter, but 2 minutes later NAU decided it had had enough. The Lumberjacks put the Eagles away with an 18-6 burst that consisted exclusively of 3-pointers - three of which came off the hot hands of Land.

Williams, who led Eastern with 15 points, did most of his damage late in the game when the Eagles briefly rattled NAU with some intense full-court defensive pressure. But NAU still dominated the last 3 minutes.

“It does have an effect on you psychologically,” Eastern senior Ryan Hansen said of NAU’s spectacular early shooting. “As a ballclub, you hope you can fight through that, but they never seemed to cool down. They were pretty hot all game.”

Hansen, the Eagles’ leading scorer, had another sub-par shooting performance and finished with eight points, nearly six less than the 13.6 he averaged in conference games. He made 2 of 11 shots and was 1 for 7 on 3-point tries.

“I was disappointed in our performance, obviously,” Aggers added. “We had a nice season, we tied for the conference championship, but, clearly, we’ve been a team struggling the last week of the season.

“My fault, my responsibility as a head coach. We just peaked maybe a week or two too soon and did not play our best basketball the last seven, eight, nine days of the season.”

N. Arizona 82, E. Washington 65

Northern Arizona (19-10)-Schwab 7-9 3-4 20, Hix 2-4 1-1 5, McClintock 4-5 0-0 8, Land 8-12 2-2 24, Lopez 4-11 4-4 15, King 2-3 0-0 4, Grundman 1-1 0-0 2, McDade 1-3 0-0 2, Gebhardt 1-1 0-0 2, Rieck 0-0 0-0 0, Wolthers 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 30-49 10-11 82.

Eastern Washington (15-12)-Olson 2-7 0-1 6, Hunter 3-4 1-3 7, White 7-12 0-0 14, Williams 7-19 1-1 16, Hansen 2-11 3-4 8, Jones 2-10 2-2 8, Levy 1-4 1-2 3, Fitzgerald 1-8 1-2 3, Quinto 0-1 0-0 0, McKie 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 25-76 9-15 65.

Halftime-Northern Arizona 42, Eastern Washington 32. 3-point goals-Northern Arizona 12-22 (Land 6-9, Schwab 3-4, Lopez 3-7, Hix 0-1, King 0-1), Eastern Washington 6-28 (Jones 2-6, Olson 2-6, Williams 1-6, Hansen 1-7, Fitzgerald 0-3). Fouled out-Levy. Rebounds-Northern Arizona 40 (McClintock 8), Eastern Washington 33 (Hansen, Hunter, Fitzgerald 5). Assists-Northern Arizona 19 (Schwab 5), Eastern Washington 8 (Williams, Hansen 3). Total fouls-Northern Arizona 17, Eastern Washington 15. CS Northridge 76, Montana 65 Carl Holmes had 21 points to lead the sixth-seeded Matadors (20-9) over the top-seeded Grizzlies (17-11).