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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Eagles rejected

Gonzaga's Adam Morrison, right, gets in the face of Paul Butorac to celebrates an EWU foul. 
 (Brian Plonka / The Spokesman-Review)

The half-hearted effort the Gongaza Bulldogs mailed in against Eastern Washington on Monday evening might have been enough to leave some coaches speechless.

But not Mark Few.

“Pathetic,” was the word Few used to described the play of his eighth-ranked Bulldogs during an uninspired 75-65 non-conference win over the Eagles at the Arena.

And he didn’t stop there.

“We got guys that are just sleep-walking through games,” added Few, who wasn’t particularly enamored with the way his Zags played in Saturday night’s 80-69 home win over Virginia, either. “The staff has tried and tried and tried to get them to understand just how tough every night out is going to be. But we’ve got a majority of them who just aren’t playing hard.

“Our staff has done everything they could, outside of physically beating them with a bat – which is probably what they deserve. But in this day and age, you can’t do that.”

So Few resorted to dressing down his lifeless Zags (8-2) at nearly every timeout and, in the end, coaxed enough out of them to hold off the raging Eagles (4-5).

Junior shooting guard Adam Morrison scored 29 points and senior center J.P. Batista added 22 as GU overcame game-long sluggishness and another so-so night at the foul line to run its winning streak against Eastern to 20 in front of an announced sellout crowd of 11,879.

The hard-luck Eagles got 20 points and seven rebounds from freshman guard Rodney Stuckey and battled the Zags to a draw on the boards. But some late-game ball-handling problems – coupled with GU’s second-half parade to the foul line – proved too much for coach Mike Burns’ young team to overcome.

“I’m happy with the effort,” Burns said, “but that was a winnable game for us. Our kids and our coaching staff felt like we should have won.”

So did Morrison, the Bulldogs’ preseason All-American, who struggled to find open shots against Eastern’s aggressive defense and finished just 11 of 23 from the field and 5 of 10 from the foul line.

“We’re lucky to get out of here with a win,” he admitted. “We’ve got to get out of this lull that we’re in. We’re winning games, but we’re not flying around and diving on the floor – and that’s me included.

“All the guys know that. We’ve been talking about it. But talk is cheap. We have to start doing it.”

Derek Raivio, the Zags’ junior point guard, who made just one of the seven shots he attempted and finished with only five points, said he and his teammates “just played awful.

“We didn’t come out ready and played flat,” he added.

And Eastern, which got 13 points from Jake Beitinger and 12 more from Kellen Williams, exploited GU’s lack of energy to the fullest, battling back from a 36-32 halftime deficit to take a 58-55 lead on Deuce Smith’s 3-pointer from the right wing with 9:21 left in the game.

The Eagles then turned the ball over on four straight possessions, however, and let the Bulldogs loose on a 20-7 run to close the game. The Zags went to the foul line 12 times in the last 5:19 and knocked down 11 free throws.

“There was a stretch there in the last four or five minutes where it got really physical,” Burns said. “We were getting bumped around a little bit, and had a couple of turnovers.”

Burns expressed dismay over a foul call on Beitinger – his fifth of the game – that sent Morrison to the line with 2:15 remaining.

“I thought Jake did a great job of blocking that shot where he got his fifth foul,” he said. “A couple of those go the other way, and it could be a different ballgame. But there was a stretch there, inside of 5 minutes, when they got the ball inside to their big guy (Batista) and Morrison.”

Batista, who had trouble finishing most of the night, scored nine of his points during GU’s late-game run, but finished an uncharacteristic 7-for-15 from the field and, like Morrison, seemed a bit indifferent in his approach.

“And when your main guns are like that, then you’ve got some problems,” Few said. “I don’t want to take anything away from Eastern. They had a great approach tonight. They could probably see it in our guys’ eyes. Our guys looked half asleep.

“You can warn them 57 times and yell at them 107, but as some point – as a competitor – you’ve got to step up and learn to do it by yourself. All the great teams, all the great players we’ve had here, were self-motivated and driven and understood how to play hard on most every possession. And this team just isn’t grasping that.”

The Zags have little time to get it right before heading to Saint Louis for a Thursday night game against the Billikens (5-4) that tips off at 5:30 PST. Eastern returns to Reese Court in Cheney on Friday to take on Cal Poly SLO in a non-conference showdown that tips off at 7:05 p.m.

Gonzaga 75, Eastern Washington 65

FGFTReb
EWU (4-5)MinM-AM-AO-TAPFPTS
Beitinger274-84-70-32513
Williams284-62-30-41412
Butorac333-50-11-8347
Stuckey367-155-62-72220
Smith321-82-22-4415
Penoncello173-60-00-0318
Bekkering130-30-03-6130
Humphrey40-00-00-0010
Zumwalt30-10-00-0000
Risper70-20-00-1030
Totals 20022-5413-1913-40162465

Percentages: FG .407, FT .684. 3-Point Goals: 8-21, .381 (Williams 2-2, Penoncello 2-5, Butorac 1-1, Beitinger 1-2, Smith 1-4, Stuckey 1-6, Zumwalt 0-1). Team Rebounds: 7. Blocked Shots: 6 (Beitinger 2, Stuckey, Bekkering, Humphrey, Zumwalt). Turnovers: 16 (Stuckey 6, Butorac 5, Penoncello 2, TEAM 2, Risper). Steals: 2 (Beitinger 2). Technical Fouls: None.

FGFTReb
GU (8-2)MinM-AM-AO-TAPFPTS
Morrison3911-235-102-64229
Batista357-158-102-61222
Mallon213-71-21-3127
Altidor-Cespedes241-11-10-2323
Raivio281-72-20-1135
Pargo140-20-01-2110
Gurganious101-10-00-2102
Knight40-00-00-1000
Pendergraft251-25-63-9247
Totals 20025-5822-3115-40141675

Percentages: FG .431, FT .710. 3-Point Goals: 3-11, .273 (Morrison 2-5, Raivio 1-6). Team Rebounds: 8. Blocked Shots: 3 (Batista, Gurganious, Pendergraft). Turnovers: 6 (Batista 2, Mallon 2, Morrison, TEAM). Steals: 9 (Gurganious 3, Pargo 2, Morrison, Batista, Raivio, Pendergraft). Technical Fouls: None.

Halftime–Gonzaga 36, Eastern Washington 32. A–11,879.