For almost four months now that the Big Sky season is winding down, Travis DeCuire has been searching for lineups that can consistently score at one end and get stops at the other. Following Saturday’s 76-59 win over Northern Arizona at the J. Lawrence Walkup Skydome, Montana’s hope is that it might have provided DeCuire those combinations.
“There’s no question that was probably our best 36 minutes,” said DeCuire in a postgame interview with KGVO Radio after Montana won its third straight and moved into a fourth-place tie in the Big Sky Conference with Idaho with five games remaining in the regular season.
In what Montana’s third-year coach expected to be a physical contest, the Grizzlies out-rebounded the conference’s best team on the glass, limited the Lumberjacks’ bruising senior front-court duo of Jordyn Martin and Ako Kaluna and consistently relied on their own post players when the offense needed points.
Montana redshirt freshman Jared Samuelson/ by Jason Bacaj
In a stark contrast to their visit to Northern Arizona last season, which ended with a double overtime win and a school record 18 3-pointers, Montana (13-13 overall, 8-5 Big Sky) did a great deal of its damage in the paint. Jared Samuelson, a freshman who has strung together three of his better games since recovering from a minor toe injury, scored a career-high 20 as the Griz finished with 34 points in the paint.
Samuelson, junior Fabijan Krslovic, senior Jack Lopez and the myriad players who cycle in and out of the paint in Montana’s ever-changing lineups were prepped early this week for the Lumberjacks’ physical style. DeCuire said a portion of Monday’s practice was focused on NAU (7-19, 4-9) and the coach was confident following Thursday’s win over Southern Utah that Montana was prepared.
It took time for Montana to find an offensive rhythm, but once the Griz did, they slowly pulled away from their host.
“There is no team in our conference like this in terms of how physical they play around the paint,” said DeCuire, who moved to 5-0 against Northern Arizona as Montana’s coach. “Once we got a feel for it — once we got to stick our toes in the water and see how warm it was — we then responded and worked our way through it. I’m definitely impressed with our team right now.”
Samuelson, who scored on a number of baby hooks, step throughs and drop offs from Montana’s slashing guards, scored seven points in a 12-2 run that erased the ’Jacks’ four-point lead and put Montana up 29-23. Northern Arizona cut the lead to one, but Montana responded hitting its final three shots of the half to go up seven at the half.
Going right at Martin, a former conference defensive player of the year, and Kaluna, the heaviest post player in the Big Sky, Samuelson scored 11 points in the first 10 minutes of the half as Montana’s lead increased to 13. Samuelson’s career night came on the heels of a 2-for-2 night against Montana State and a 3-for-6 outing in the win over Southern Utah. He was 7 for 9 and hit all six of his free throw attempts Saturday.
“He’s playing phenomenal ball, which allows us to have him in there and it’s another offensive threat,” DeCuire said of the freshman post.
A good portion of Samuelson’s second-half production came in a 16-2 run that ended with back-to-back buckets from Krslovic and Michael Oguine and effectively put the Griz in front the rest of the way.
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Montana was lifted in the first half by the return of sophomore point guard Ahmaad Rorie, who missed the second half Thursday after sustaining an injury early in the first half at Southern Utah. Rorie hit a couple threes and finished the night with 14, the only other double-figure scoring total.
“I told the guys at halftime we should be in double figures if we don’t break down in a couple areas,” DeCuire said. “We found some things offensively that were working for us. We played both sides of the ball. I’m happy with the guys.”
NOTES: Samuelson’s 20 accounted for half of the Grizzlies’ 40 bench points. Freshman Sayeed Pridgett and sophomore Bobby Moorehead each scored eight. The Montana bench scored 46 on Thursday night. … Montana out-rebounded Northern Arizona 36-31. … The Griz shot 60 percent in the second half. … Montana scored 15 points on Northern Arizona’s 10 turnovers.
