Milly Knowles leads Eastern Washington women past Idaho 74-59

Whether it was the added energy of a rivalry game, a home doubleheader, good preparation, or the hope of eating doughnuts the next day, the Eastern Washington women’s basketball team certainly found a groove Saturday afternoon.

Trailing by two points at halftime, the Eagles surged ahead of Idaho in the third quarter and cruised to a 74-59 victory at Reese Court, ending a nine-game losing streak to their Big Sky rival.

Redshirt junior Milly Knowles led the charge, scoring eight consecutive points for Eastern as it pulled ahead in the third quarter. She finished with a career-high 14 points on 7-of-12 shooting from the field and also grabbed five rebounds. EWU finished with a 51-29 rebounding edge.

It was the first time Eastern (9-6 overall, 2-3 Big Sky) outrebounded a conference foe this season.

“We emphasize crashing the boards every single week,” Knowles said, “(but) it’s something that we haven’t been doing great in.”

Coaches also gave the Eagles a bit of a lighthearted incentive: If they grabbed more rebounds than the Vandals (6-10, 2-3), they would get doughnuts before the next practice.

Another point of emphasis heading into the game was to play better 1-on-1 defense against an Idaho team that likes to attack, EWU coach Joddie Gleason said.

“We’ve been giving up way too many points in our first four conference games,” Gleason said.

“As simple as it might seem, we really just tried to work on veering people off the path they want to go. So if they want to go to the basket, then we want to angle them two or three steps to the side.”

The Eagles bought into the strategy, Gleason said. While the Vandals’ top-three scorers got their points – Sydney Gandy had 21, Beyonce Bea (the Big Sky’s leading scorer) 20 and Rosa Smith 11 – no one else scored more than three.

Eastern got 16 points from Jaydia Martin, 14 from Knowles and 12 apiece from Jaleesa Lawrence and Jamie Loera. The senior Loera also grabbed 13 rebounds to earn her second double-double of the season.

After halftime, the Vandals made 9-of-32 shots overall and 4-of-14 3-point attempts and, like the Eagles, didn’t attempt a free throw.

Eastern focused on getting the ball inside and its offense became much more efficient, making 17-of-36 second-half shots and 3-of-4 3-pointers.

“I just think that we started looking inside a bit more,” Knowles said. “We were executing really well.”

After Idaho cut Eastern’s lead to 55-50 early in the fourth quarter, Loera hit a 3 and made a putback on the next possession to give the Eagles their first double-digit lead of the game with 6:50 left.

That led Idaho coach Jon Newlee to call timeout, but the Vandals never got their deficit back to single digits.

The Eagles outscored the Vandals 38-22 in the paint and had a 14-2 edge in second-chance points, both products of their outsized rebounding advantage (plus-22), which was a season best . EWU shot 41.7% from the field and 43.8% from 3-point range.

Both teams have a quick turnaround with a game on Monday: Idaho plays at Montana State, while Eastern plays at Montana. The Grizzlies beat the Eagles 81-70 on Dec. 29 in Cheney.

Whitworth 57, George Fox 45: Quincy McDeid scored a game-high 19 points and the Pirates (5-10, 2-4) locked down the Bruins (5-10, 2-4) in the second half en route to a Northwest Conference victory at the Whitworth Fieldhouse.

Whitworth trailed 31-26 at halftime, but the Pirates held George Fox to 5-for-24 shooting from the field in the second half to fuel the comeback.

Olivia Mayer added 12 points, 11 rebounds and six assists for the Pirates.

Erin Yoshitake paced the Bruins with 15 points and Alyssa Wells added 10.

Walla Walla 57, North Idaho 51: Paige Pentzer scored 15 points, and the Warriors (14-2, 4-0) outlasted the Cardinals (8-7, 2-2) in a Northwest Athletic Conference matchup in Coeur d’Alene.

Paige Beem led all scorers with 19 points for North Idaho.