Danny Sprinkle sat in front of the press following rivalry games plenty of times during his time as a standout player at Montana State in the last 1990s.
On the first day of February 2020, Sprinkle sat in front of a dozen reporters for the first time as the head coach at his alma mater following a Cat-Griz game. This showdown happened to be the 300th in the rivalry’s rich history, the Grizzlies happened to shoot the lights out and the rivalry continued to be lopsided in UM’s favor following Montana’s 78-64 win over Montana State in Missoula three weeks ago.
The Bobcats have played with renewed vigor, particularly defensively, during a 14-11 start to the Sprinkle era. Montana State has won five of its last eight games to sit in fourth place alone with six games to play in the regular season. MSU is 8-6 in Big Sky Conference play. Montana State’s last three losses have come at the hands of Eastern Washington (twice) and against the two-time defending Big Sky champions in Missoula.
The Bobcats’ loss at Dahlberg Arena was the 18th time in their last 19 outings against the Griz. Montana has been to five NCAA Tournaments over the last 10 years. UM has been to the Big Dance nine times since the last time Montana State advance to March Madness during Sprinkle’s freshman season in 1996.
Following his first rivalry loss as a coach, Sprinkle had a chance to observe first-hand the gap between his team and the league’s premier program. He has tried to channel what he learned to spark his team with the league tournament quickly approaching.
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“I told my team after the game in the locker room that you have to get your tail kicked sometimes,” Sprinkle said on February 1. “It’s not always easy. There’s going to be days like this. I told them, ‘I hope this hurts like heck until midnight. But once it’s midnight, you have to shower and let this rinse off and we have to get better tomorrow.
“Tonight was not the championship. But we saw what you have to do to play at a championship level. We have something to work toward and that’s what we have to practice toward.”
Unflappable senior point guard Harald Frey, a multi-time All-Big Sky performer who is again in line for all-conference honors, leads Sprinkle’s squad. Junior college transfers guard Amin Adamu and center Jubrile Belo have been pleasant surprises. And the Bobcats have gotten good minutes from a group of previously unknown role players like true freshman Borja Fernandez.
That group of largely fresh faces have responded from that loss to the Griz by winning three out of four and sitting in the driver’s seat for a first-round bye in next month’s Big Sky Tournament.
The experience of allowing Montana to hit 10 first-half 3-pointers and score 54 points before the break was a shocking one for Sprinkle’s group. Following the loss, he hoped it would lead to growth. Over the last two weeks, the Bobcats have done what they’ve done best all season: defended their home court. And that’s put them in position to push for a first-round bye at the Big Sky Tournament in Boise in March.
“I didn’t think we were very tough,” Sprinkle said following his first rivalry loss. “We weren’t very tough whether it was driving through contact or getting the ball to the rim or getting to the spot we want to get to, I thought they dictated the first 20 minutes.
“You have to experience getting slapped in the side of the face. I told them at halftime, ‘I’m going to see your character in this second half.’ I thought like most of the year, we responded in the second half. But you can’t do it for just 20 minutes. Not against a great team like Montana.”
Montana State responded from the rivalry loss by running away from Idaho in the second half of a 72-50 Bobcat win in Bozeman. Two nights days later, MSU played its worst offensive game this year, shooting 22.4 percent in a 74-49 loss at Eastern Washington.
The Bobcats completed their season sweeps of Idaho State and Weber State last weekend by winning two at home, moving to 8-3 at Brick Breeden Fieldhouse in the process.
And that’s where Montana State will meet the Grizzlies Saturday night. But not before having to do what the Grizzlies did to begin the month. MSU will play at Portland State on Thursday night while the Griz, like the Bobcats previously, have this week off.
“Our sweep over the weekend was huge,” Sprinkle said in an interview conducted on Tuesday. “It meant a lot in the standings. There’s a bunch of us jumbled up in the middle of the standings. To take care of our home court was huge. And to get the first sweep we’ve had over Weber State since 2005, it’s always good when you are building a program.
“But we still have six games left and the six games we have are brutal. We have the three home games (Montana, Southern Utah, Northern Colorado) are against three of the top teams in the conference. The three road games are typical Big Sky travel, at Sac State, at NAU and at Portland State this Thursday.”
Montana State is a game ahead of NAU in the loss column but still have to play in Flagstaff on February 29. Southern Utah dropped games to Sac State and NAU last weekend and sit at 7-7. Portland State is 7-8 with an MSU that is 4-8 on the road this season coming to town. Sac State and Weber State are 6-9 yet still in the mix for a top-five finish and the first-round bye that goes with it.
“We have our work cut out for us these last six games,” Sprinkle said.
Montana State and the rest of the Big Sky is once again looking up at the Grizzlies. Montana lost five seniors off of a team that won a school-record 52 games over the last two seasons. Steady, explosive point guard Ahmaad Rorie and hyper athletic two-guard Michael Oguine made up arguably the best backcourt in school history.
Montana also said goodbye to defensive stalwart and glue guy Bobby Moorehead, stout, strong center Jamar Akoh and stretch forward Donaven Dorsey, a former University of Washington transfer.
Yet Sayeed Pridgett’s emergence as an elite leader, DeCuire’s ability to cultivate role definition with a largely previously unproven roster, the elevated scoring ability of senior Kendal Manuel and the overall chemistry of the group have the Griz sitting in first place.
Montana has an identical schedule as the Bobcats minus the trip to Portland State and plus a trip to Bozeman remaining.
“I won’t worry about the postseason until after we play that last conference came,’ DeCuire said before last week’s home sweep of WSU and ISU, respectively. “We will see where we are at and go deal with postseason when we get to it.”
Pridgett, one of three seniors on the squad but the only one to start and finish career at Montana, has emerged as the league’s most versatile player and UM’s undisputed leader. He has flirted with a triple-double on four occasions, missing the historic stat line by a single assist in UM’s 78-63 win over Idaho State.
Pridgett has scored 20 or more points 10 times this season. He is averaging 20.0 points per game in league play He is also Montana’s leading rebounder (7.4 per game). He is averaging 4.2 assists per game in league play, the fifth-best average in the league. He earned Big Sky Player of the Week this week for the second time this season and the fifth time in his career.
It’s been Pridgett’s wiliness as a passer that has transformed Montana’s offense into one of the most efficient in the Big Sky. Manuel has received extra defensive attention in league play but is still averaging 17.3 points per game in Big Sky games. The Billings native is shooting 44.4 percent from beyond the arc in league play.
Outside its star seniors, it’s been Montana’s role players knocking down open 3-point looks off Pridgett passes out of double teams that has made the Griz almost unguardable. Senior Jared Samuelson, junior Timmy Falls and freshman Josh Vazquez have combined to hit 44 3-pointers in league play.
“We work on me getting double teamed all the time and when we are monstering (trapping in the post) someone on the team, we have to go through that possession where we flip offense and defense,” Pridgett said after helping Montana to its fifth straight win with the Idaho State victory. “I know where the trap is coming from and I know how to bait the trap to get the reads.”
Against Montana State, Pridgett doled out five first-half assists, finding freshman Josh Vazquez for two first-half 3-pointers, true freshman Kyle Owens for one triple that could’ve been two if his foot wouldn’t have been on the line, and one of Manuel’s four first-half 3s in as many attempts.
Pridgett himself knocked down two 3-pointers and junior Timmy Falls put an exclamation point on UM’s best offensive first half of the season by joining in on the barrage.
“You never know who is going to go off for us,” Pridgett said. “A lot of nights, I’m not even the leading scorer and I’m perfectly fine with that knowing we have so many weapons on this team.”
The Griz burst out to a 7-1 start in league play before hitting a skid. The Griz lost 87-85 in overtime at Weber State, a team they beat 72-37 less than three weeks later. Four days after the trip to Portland, Montana looked flat for the first 35 minutes of an 88-81 loss at Portland State two days before the rivalry game with the Bobcats.
That loss served as Montana’s wake-up call. The Griz have won their last five games by an average of 17 points and by an average of 13 even with taking the Weber State beat down (WSU leading scorer Jerrick Harding did not play).
It’s hard to say if the Griz were distracted when they visited Portland State or if the Vikings just have Montana’s number. PSU swept Montana last season, too.
Regardless, Montana has bounced back in resounding fashion and appears to be the Big Sky favorites once again with less than a month left in the regular season.
This week, it’s the Bobcats who have to prepare for a matchup against star point guard Holland Woods and the hyper-active, athletic Vikings. Sprinkle hopes his players are ready for the latest challenge.
“It’s hard because being in Montana, the rivalry is all people talk about,” Sprinkle said. “But Thursday is a huge game for the standings. Portland State is playing really good basketball right now. They handled Idaho (90-69 on Monday) night and they have gotten a few guys back, are back to full strength.”
Santa Clara grad transfer Matt Hauser, who missed time earlier this year with an ankle injury, has poured in 24 points each of PSU’s last two games. Big man Sal Nuhu is also back to full strength after missing PSU’s first game in Missoula, an 85-70 loss on January 13.
The Bobcats will have to play a team that has wins over Northern Colorado and Montana, a team that won at Montana State 77-76 on January 11.
“We have our work cut out for us on Thursday and then we have to turn our attention to Montana,” Sprinkle said. “But they did the same thing earlier in the year. They had to go to Portland State and then come back before we played them in Missoula. It’s an even playing field. Hopefully, I can do as good a job as Coach DeCuire did up there. He does a tremendous job.”
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Photos by Brooks Nuanez. All Rights Reserved.
