WSU blows double-digit lead in 67-66 road loss to LMU, falling out of contention for key conference tournament bye

PULLMAN — Last week, not long after his Washington State group dropped a forgettable loss to conference powerhouse Saint Mary’s, David Riley sat in a Beasley Coliseum side room and lamented one theme that has haunted his group this season.

“When you’re playing a good team like that, they’re gonna throw punches,” Riley said, “and we gotta get off the mat a little better.”

Riley was referring to the way the Gaels generated runs throughout the game, putting the onus on the Cougars to respond. On several occasions, they did. But eventually, a seasoned Saint Mary’s team landed the knockout blow.

Mostly, Riley said, he wanted to see his team follow with runs of its own. The Cougs have done that, just not consistently enough. Even before WSU hit the road for Wednesday’s road test against LMU, Riley took care to mention the importance of his club’s mental fortitude.

Letting a double-digit lead slip in a 67-66 loss to LMU, Washington State may still be working to establish it. The Cougars were up 15 at halftime, only for the Lions to roar back and eliminate WSU from contention for the No. 4 seed in next week’s conference tournament, which comes with a bye to the quarterfinals. 

 

To earn that, the Cougs needed to win their final two regular-season games and get some help from teams around them in the standings. Now tied for sixth place, WSU has one more game left on its regular-season slate, a road test on Saturday against Pepperdine, the conference’s last-place team. 

 

The Cougars were largely undone by Lion guard MJ Amey Jr., who piled up 31 points, including 20 in the second half. That’s his career-high against a Division-I opponent.

 

“That second half, we didn’t execute defensively,” Riley said in a postgame radio interview. “That’s the biggest difference in the game. We had some coverage errors. We did a great job in the first half, and we let Amy get going, especially in the second. I mean, he had a good first half too, but we let him get going. We let some guys get some shots that they shouldn’t get. And when you get rhythm against good players, that’s not gonna cut it.”

Three scored in double figures for WSU, including 20 points from Ace Glass and 12 apiece from Ri Vavers and Eemeli Yalaho, but that wasn’t enough to stop LMU from taking only its second lead of the game with 92 seconds to play. Among his 31 points for the Lions, Amey generated several key baskets in crunch time.

This means that WSU (12-18, 7-10) has now lost games when it led by margins of 12, eight, 17, and 15 in the second half. In Wednesday’s game, the Cougs lost 17 turnovers, which the Lions parlayed into 22 points.

With some 90 seconds to play, Jan Vide — who torched the Cougs for 28 points in their first meeting last month — went to the free throw line and hit two shots, handing LMU a 62-61 lead, his team’s first since the game’s opening minutes. On the other end, the ball was in the hands of Glass, who got into the paint and put up a floater, but it rimmed out and the Lions grabbed the rebound.

That paved the way for LMU to cushion its lead with a driving layup from Amey, only for Glass to follow with a mid-range jumper. That helped the Cougars trim the Lions’ lead to one with 52 seconds to play, but it returned to three moments later with two free throws from Amey, who was fouled on his way to the basket.

With a chance to tie things in the final seconds, Vavers couldn’t convert on a triple try from straightaway, letting LMU ice things at the free throw line.

 

It bore a stark contrast from the first half. In the first 20 minutes of Wednesday’s game, the Cougars scored 39 points, connecting on 7 of 13 attempts from 3-point range. In the second, they managed only 24 points, hitting just 2 of 7 tries from deep.

 

Sound familiar? It should. In last week’s loss to Saint Mary’s, WSU hit 7 of 12 treys in the first half, then 0 of 7 in the second. This much has become clear: Opponents are adjusting and taking away the Cougars’ catch-and-shoot opportunities as games unfold.

Up a commanding 15 points at halftime, WSU found itself in a dogfight only a few minutes into the second half. With a quick 9-2 run, the Lions quickly drew within single digits, forcing the visitors to take a timeout before the second half turned two minutes old.

One of the game’s biggest shots came courtesy of Vavers, who cashed in with about three minutes to go. As a teammate drove to the basket, he drifted to the right corner, where he caught the ball in-stride and put it in, pushing the Cougs’ lead to four. The Lions had all the momentum, but Riley’s team kept generating enough scoring to hang on to the lead.

But moments later, LMU matched it with a 3-pointer of its own. That one came from guard Rodney Brown, who knocked one down from the left wing, pulling the Lions back within one. The Cougars followed with a turnover, but they came up with their own to cling to the lead.

 

“I don’t want to not give them credit, because they did pressure the ball a lot more and they put us on our heels,” Riley said, “but we took a bunch of first-action shots in the first side rather than being patient and getting the ball to the paint and moving on to the second action. We tried to do it ourselves. I don’t know how many times I gotta say it on the road: we gotta trust ourselves, trust our teammates in these tough environments. And that’s the difference in the game.”

 

When they take the court against Pepperdine on Saturday, the Cougars will be looking for only their second road win of the season. Their first came in a five-point victory over Portland in late December.

 

“It’s sickening to keep saying it, but we’re getting closer and closer. I didn’t think we’d get any closer than the last couple times we’ve been on the road. But this is a game that we gotta learn from,” Riley said. “We gotta learn how to learn how to not make these errors. We gotta learn how to stick with with the gameplan defensively. We gotta learn how to stick with each other offensively in the second half, and we gotta go win on the road. We go do that, we’ve shown we can play with anyone in the tournament. This is a chance for us to make this next step.”