EWU enters quiet stretch of schedule
During one of college basketball’s busiest midwinter stretches, Eastern Washington University finds itself in the unusual position of playing just three games in 17 days.
The Eagles, idle since Sunday afternoon, travel to Greeley, Colo., to take on Northern Colorado tonight, but they don’t play again until Wednesday night, when Montana travels to Reese Court. Three nights later, Eastern travels to Portland State to face the Vikings, but it has another four-day layoff before venturing to Bozeman to take on Montana State on Jan. 29.
“In terms of the amount of rest and days of preparation, it sets up pretty well for us,” EWU coach Kirk Earlywine said of his team’s light schedule. “Now we have to go prove we’re tough enough to win on the road in a tough environment and close game.
“We haven’t done that since the Portland game in early December.”
Eastern beat the Pilots 63-58 in Portland on Dec. 3, but it has lost four of the five road games it has played since.
Freshmen come on
Washington State’s freshmen have played more integral roles as the season has worn on, with DeAngelo Casto and Klay Thompson having key roles in the win over Stanford and Abe Lodwick, with a key 3-pointer, and Marcus Capers also contributing.
“I think they’ve taken some strides,” WSU coach Tony Bennett said of the group, though he’s still not sure who will contribute on a given night. “We’re still a little fuzzy with our rotation, and we might be that way all year about who is the eighth, ninth and 10th guy.”
After his performance against Stanford, Casto, from Ferris High, was running with the starters this week in practice and may start tonight.
Familiar foe
Tonight’s game with Oregon State won’t be the first time WSU’s Bennett and Craig Robinson have been on opposing benches. The first-year Beavers head coach was an assistant at Northwestern when Bennett assisted at Wisconsin.
Longing for home
Idaho is in the midst of a rough stretch to open WAC play – four of its first five league games on the road. But it will soon start getting used to the Palouse winter. After this weekend, the Vandals play five of their next six contests at the Kibbie Dome.
The home swing starts Jan. 24 against New Mexico State.
Sleeping giant?
Santa Clara’s 0-2 league mark probably shouldn’t make Gonzaga breath easy.
“They should have been 2-0,” GU coach Mark Few said. “They lost both in the waning seconds on some strange plays.”
“We’re experiencing the highs and lows you’d expect a young team to go through,” SCU coach Kerry Keating said. “We’ve lost nine games by a total of 37 points. In five of them, we led at halftime. In almost all of them we turned the ball over too much.”