Lights halve home stand with RMC, Western

Life on the road in the Frontier Conference is tough. And that’s what makes playing at home so sweet. The MSU-Northern Lights certainly took advantage of that fact Friday night.

Playing their first Frontier Conference game in the Armory Gymnasium, the No. 15 Lights got off to a hot start and never looked back in a 65-55 win over Rocky Mountain College.

And after back-to-back losses to UGF and Carroll College last weekend, getting off to a hot start offensively against the Battlin’ Bears was paramount, and Northern did just that, as Cameron Epps knocked in an early 3-pointer to spark a 9-0 run. Epps added another three at the 9:36 mark of the first half, and the Lights rattled off 17 unanswered points, capped by an ally-oop dunk by Ryan Reeves, which gave Northern a 34-12 lead with 4:47 left in a first half MSU-N would eventually lead 40-23.

“Being back on our home court was big,” Epps said. “The fans were excited right from the start of the game. And we came out and did our jobs. It was a total team effort tonight. Everybody just did their job.”

Of course, Rocky had a job to do, too, and that was to stay in the game, and thanks to a 15-2 run to start the second half, the Bears did just that as Taylor Longo capped the spurt with a triple that cut the Lights’ lead to 43-38.

However, that would be as close as the Bears would get. Kevin Oberweiser answered Longo’s three with one of his own, while Reeves and William Walker combined for six points in the paint to push Northern’s lead back to 10. David Straughter also scored two key buckets in the final six minutes, and a layup by Tyler Chandler with 1:38 to play put Northern ahead by double digits again, and essentially sealed the win.

Northern, which had struggled offensively in its previous two losses, shot a sizzling 51 percent from the field, and got 15 points and nine rebounds from Reeves. The Lights also out-rebounded Rocky and had balance, with Epps and Walker each scoring nine, while Chandler and Straughter chipped in six apiece. RMC got 15 points form Riley Bradshaw in the loss.

“We were focused on just getting this one,” Epps, who was recently inserted into the starting lineup, said. “You can’t win three games in one night. You can’t look too far ahead, and that’s what we did. We just focused on coming out and getting this one.”

“I was proud of the way our guys put last week behind them,” added Northern head coach Shawn Huse. “We came out with energy, and our defense early really sparked us. We know Rocky can score points in a hurry, but I felt like we had great defensive energy right from the start and that was big for us.

“Down the stretch, I also really liked how poised we were,” he added. “Rocky made a run, but I thought we hit some big shots and made some key free throws to answer that run. So our guys did a really good job of keeping them (Bears) at bay, and it was really good to come back home and get a win.”

Dawg Bite

Fresh off a big home win, the Northern men turned their attention to a huge showdown with the No. 11 UM-Western Bulldogs, a team that had yet to lose a Frontier Conference game.

And, like so many games between the Lights and Bulldogs, it was indeed a battle, except for the final 10 minutes, where Western hit big shot after big shot, and the Lights didn’t. And the end result was a 75-62 Western win, which dropped the Lights back to .500 in league play.

“I felt like, for a long period of time, this was a game that was going to go right down to the wire,” Northern head coach Shawn Huse said. “And then all of sudden, it slipped away from us.

“First, give credit to Western for that,” he continued. “They played really well, shot it really well. And for us, we just didn’t get the shots to go in down the stretch and we also had some crucial turnovers at the same time, and the next thing you know, we’re down 10 and we just weren’t able to recover.”

Western did shoot it well, in particular Dom Robinson and Shyke Smalls, who combined for 51 points, and helped the Dawgs shoot a scorching 56 percent on a Northern defense that came into the game leading the NAIA in field goal defense.

“They (Bulldogs) shot it extremely well,” Huse said. “They found ways to get good shots against our defense, which hasn’t happened to us too many times this season. And they made them.”

And while the Lights lost their third game in their last four outings, for much of the contest, it looked like it could have gone the other way.

MSU-N jumped out to a 9-2 lead as Tyler Chandler and Ryan Reeves were impacting the game early, Chandler by hitting a 3-pointer, and Reeves blocking shots on the other end. Chandler added another triple later in the first half, and when Devin Bray hit his second bomb of the stanza, the Lights led 28-26. However, Smalls was already rolling on the other end, and he finished the half with 15 points, including drilling his second triple late in the period, lifting Western to a 33-32 lead.

And still, the Lights were right there. Northern got two more threes each from Bray and Cameron Epps, and Epps’ second bomb knotted the game at 52-52. From there, however, Western took over, and in particular, Robinson. The 5-8 junior guard spent the rest of the game driving to the hole, dishing out amazing passes or burying threes — the latter of which he did on back-to-back occasions with under four minutes to play, which put the Dawgs ahead 71-58, and left Northern with little time to answer.

Robinson would finish with four treys and a game-high 26 points, while Smalls finished with 25 and Kooper Kidgell added 10. Western’s numbers overall were scorching hot, too, even against a Lights defense that allowed just 56 points per night, which was second-best in the NAIA.

“Our defensive effort was good,” Huse said. “We played hard and we fought hard all night. But they made the shots, and offensively, we just didn’t make enough shots, or enough free throws to keep pace when we need to most. That was the difference.”

Northern shot 44 percent, and made eight threes, but the Lights had to attempt 32 against Western’s zone defense, and they also missed the services of key reserve Charles Porter, who was injured in the first half. Bray finished with a team-high 12 points on four bombs, while Epps, Chandler and David Straughter scored 10 each.

The loss dropped Northern to 3-3 in league play and 14-4 overall. And yet, the Lights are still right in the thick of the Frontier race, with four straight home games in front of them. Northern faces Montana Tech Friday night and Lewis-Clark State Saturday.

Lights are 3-3 in Frontier, 14-4 overall; Next Up: vs Tech Friday

Lights 65, Rocky Mountain 55

RMC - Derek Graves 1-3 1-2 4, Taylor Longo 4-11 0-0 10, Zach Hinton 3-10 1-2 7, Chad Kananen 2-8 0-0 6, Danny Betcher 4-6 2-2 10, Riley Bradshaw 5-12 5-5 15, Grant Wallace 0-1 0-0 0, Craig Wilmore 1-3 0-0 2, Trey Larson 0-1 0-0 0, Isaac Martel 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 20-55 9-11 54.

MSU-N - Cameron Epps 3-5 1-2 9, Adam Huse 0-1 0-0 0, Badhasa Margarsa 1-2 2-2 4, Kevin Oberweiser 2-4 0-0 5, Devin Bray 0-0 0-0 0, David Straughter 3-7 0-0 6, Dylan Tatarka 1-1 0-0 2, Justin Dunsmore 0-3 5-7 5, Charles Porter 1-3 2-3 4, Tyler Chandler 2-4 2-2 6, Seth Christiaens 0-0 1-2 1, Ryan Reeves 6-10 3-6 15, William Walker 3-3 3-4 9. Totals 22-43 19-28 66.

Halftime: Northern 40-23. 3-pt FG: RMC 5-20 (Graves 1-1, Longo 2-7, Hinton 0-2, Kananen 2-7, Bradshaw 0-2, Wilmore 0-1), MSU-N 3-10 (Epps 2-3, Huse 0-1, Oberweiser 1-2, Dunsmore 0-1, Porter 0-1, Chandler 0-2). Rebounds: RMC 21 (Hinton 7), MSU-N 35 (Reeves 9). Fouls: RMC 20, MSU-N 14. Fouled out: Hinton.

Western 75, Lights 62

UM-W - Shyke Smalls 10-15 2-2 25, Zaccheus Darko-Kelly 1-4 0-0 2, Riley King 1-4 0-0 2, Derek Durocher 1-1 0-0 3, Dom Robinson 9-15 4-4 26, Troy Scott 0-0 0-0 0, Chase Haack 0-2 0-0 0, Marcus Payne 1-3 1-2 3, Kooper Kidgell 5-7 0-0 10, Cameron Evans 2-3 0-0 4. Totals 30-54 7-8 75.

MSU-N - Cameron Epps 4-11 0-0 10, Adam Huse 0-0 0-0 0, Badhasa Margarsa 1-3 0-0 2, Kevin Oberweiser 0-3 0-0 0, Devin Bray 4-8 0-0 12, David Straughter 3-7 4-4 10, Dylan Tatarka 1-4 0-0 2, Justin Dunsmore 4-6 0-2 8, Charles Porter 1-2 0-0 2, Tyler Chandler 3-8 2-2 10, Ryan Reeves 3-3 0-0 6, William Walker 0-0 0-1 0. Totals 24-55 6-9 62.

Halftime: Western 33-32. 3-pt FG: UM-W 8-15 (Smalls 3-6, Durocher 1-1, Robinson 4-7, Kidgell 0-1), MSU-N 8-32 (Epps 2-7, Margarsa 0-1, Oberweiser 0-3, Bray 4-8, Straughter 0-1, Tatarka 0-3, Dunsmore 0-1, Porter 0-1, Chandler 2-7). Rebounds: UM-W 26 (TEAM 5), MSU-N 32 (Reeves 9). Fouls: UM-W 14, MSU-N 14. Fouled out: none.