Eastern Washington basketball teams complete season sweeps of Montana

The Eastern Washington men’s basketball team had its most efficient shooting night in two months and claimed perhaps its most impressive win of the season, completing a season sweep of one of the conference’s top teams.

The Eagles surged past Montana 82-74 on Thursday night at Dahlberg Arena in Missoula.

EWU (6-17, 4-6 Big Sky) got hot in the second half to overtake the Grizzlies (13-11, 7-4), who entered the game at third in the Big Sky standings after being picked in the preseason to repeat as conference champions. Eastern outscored Montana 48-38 after halftime.

The Eagles shot 51.8% from the field, their best mark since early December, and went 9 of 22 from 3-point distance. Do-it-all EWU guard Isaiah Moses logged 13 points, eight assists and seven rebounds, and forward Kiree Huie tallied 15 points and nine rebounds.

Montana, which suffered a 66-65 loss at EWU on Jan. 10, shot 50% from the floor and 7 of 20 from deep. Guard Money Williams scored 25 points.

Women

EWU 76, Montana 72: The Eagles led comfortably for much of the night and appeared headed toward an easy win, but they instead had to sweat out a narrow victory over the Grizzlies at Reese Court in Cheney.

EWU (12-11, 5-5 Big Sky) had an 11-point lead midway through the fourth, but it slipped away as Montana (7-15, 4-7) rallied to trim its deficit to one point with 14 seconds remaining. Eastern withstood the Griz comeback, icing the win from the foul line to complete a season sweep of Montana.

Eagles post Kourtney Grossman tallied 21 points (9 of 14) and 15 rebounds for her 14th double-double of the season. Forward Jaecy Eggers added 17 points and seven boards, and guard Elyn Bowers recorded 13 points, eight assists and six rebounds.

EWU shot 48.4% from the field while holding Montana to 38%.