Vikings defeat Bengals, 85-58

It appears that the Vikings have started a new conference winning streak.

Portland State seems to be cruising for their fourth conference win and will send the Idaho State Bengals home with their third consecutive loss.

Outside of the refs taking over the second half a bit, it has been a great game for Viking fans.

Midway through the second half- PSU leads 65-43

The result of the Stott Center Scuffle, and I am coining that phrase was literally, nothing.

Both teams began the second half as if the incident never happened outside of the officials conducting a minute-long conference with both coaches.

Portland State player Paul Guede who hasn't played in over a month because of a stress fracture mysteriously did not join the Vikings on the court after the intermission possibly due to his involvement in the fight although that is unverified.

Guede was in street clothes on the bench and just recently got the boot taken off his foot so I would question his mobility and ability to really throw down, not that I am an expert.

Portland State continues to hold strong, sharing the ball better than usual and getting solid inside and outside play. Julius Thomas has played outstanding down on the block and controlled the paint on the defensive end.

Idaho State has found recent success off of dribble-penetration by Stucki but they seem a little out of the game at this point to make a serious run. Plus, they really struggle from beyond the arc.

It is hard seeing how this team defeated Utah (who also beat Gonzaga), and played BYU and Utah State tough. Maybe we just aren't seeing their best tonight.

Idaho State coach Joe O'Brien just got teed up and is asking to be kicked out of the game.

Maybe he wants to avoid the possibility of being in the middle of another skirmish, this one potentially coming at the end of the game on the way to the locker room.

Halftime at the Stott, PSU leads 38-24

It has been a well played but rather ordinary first half here in Portland.

The story of the night, up to an interesting halftime incident that we'll discuss later, was the Vikings ability to get strong inside play from Jamie Jones, Julius Thomas and Tyrell Mara.

The three players have combined for 17 points, which is more than the Vikings got from those players all of the Weber State game. Portland State has also caused havoc by grabbing nine offensive rebounds and seven steals.

Idaho State looks solid, but to be honest, not well coached. Most of the Bengals look like they don't have true roles and outside of senior Matt Stucki, who hasn't scored, seem void of any true leadership.

The story of the half will undoubtedly be the minor scuffle that ensued as both teams tried to leave the floor to head to the locker room out the same door.

According to one unconfirmed eye witness, a Bengal player gave an extra nudge to at least one Viking as they ran into the small open way to head to the locker rooms. A gigantic pushing match ensued with players having to be separated by the Portland State coaching staff.

The cat fight was only observed by a small percentage of the crowd at first but quickly had the rest of the crowd and the entire press row running to get a view of the fracas.

It is unclear what will happen by way of official repercussion from the game referee's.

PSU leads 14-4 early in the first half

The Vikings have gotten off to a terrific start behind some aggressive defense, Andre Murray shooting and two fastbreak dunks by Nelson.

Idaho State has yet to find their rhythm on offense and the Vikings defense has led to some easy baskets. Well they could have been easy but Nelson upped the degree of difficulty with two pretty breathtaking dunks to get the Stott crowd off their feet.

The Vikings are also getting some decent play inside from Jamie Jones and Kyle Coston, something they didn't get at all on Thursday.

PSU vs. Idaho State Live Blog

The Vanguard will be liveblogging tonights Big Sky matchup between the Vikings and the Bengals from the Stott Center.

Notes:

Junior forward Phil Nelson is wearing a Rip Hamiltonish mask covering his face. Not sure if he was dinged up in the waning moments of the Weber State game or at practice on Friday or if he just wants to change up his style after playing so poorly at home. He is averaging just seven points during home games this season and shooting just 18 percent from beyond the arc.

Idaho State is out in their trademark orange jerseys with black trim. Let me just say this: yours truly is not a fan.

Big Sky Conference blogger extraordinaire Kellis Robinett is here live blogging for the Idaho State Journal. I am a big fan of his work and you should check it out.

The Stott Center was pretty packed for Thrusday night's game against Weber State but at least one school official was not pleased with how quiet the crowd was. He remarked that this should be the most intimidating place for opposing teams in the Big Sky because of the setup of the gym.

Vikings return home: Will the Stott be stuffed?

Thursday night not only marks the end of a pretty dang good college football season with the BCS Championship in Miami, but also will be the night in which the Vikings make their triumphant return to the Stott Center.

Since Thanksgiving the men have played three games at home: Seattle, Lewis and Clark and Montana. The Seattle and Lewis and Clark games were under-attended and the squad didn't seem too focused despite posting victories over the Pioneers and the Redbirds.

The 72-45 victory over Montana on Dec. 20 was a terrific win for the club to open the conference season, but because it came in the middle of one of the worst snow storms in the history of the Rose City, was only attended by 415.

I am interested in seeing if fans respond to this team in an appropriate fashion this weekend. Weber State and Idaho State are two of the top four teams in the conference and I think that they, along with the Vikings and Northern Colorado, will be the four teams in the Big Sky Tournament.

Fans also will have an opportunity to watch the ever-improving Vikings following a long and exhaustive road trip. By my count the team has traveled over 14,000 miles since Thanksgiving, putting your holiday trip to the parents that you complained about in perspective.

And let's remember that this team isn't traveling in one of these:

The team and small traveling party don't roll around in a custom jet. When they fly, they fly coach. The buses are not built for people of basketball height. Trust me, I am 6'5 and I don't fit on them well. When the team stays in a hotel, they usually don't stay in a Marriott but a Holiday Inn.

Hopefully fans can get a sense of the things that the squad has already overcome. By all accounts they really had every reason to lose against Northern Arizona on Sunday but overcame the odds and eventually took the Lumberjacks down.

I think head coach Ken Bone and the rest of the team are hoping that the squad gets a boost from the hometown crowd as they continue on into Big Sky play.

Vikings suffer first home loss of season

For just the second time in two seasons the women's basketball team stumbled at the Stott Center. The Vikings were defeated by Utah Valley University 102-92 in a overtime game.

The Vikings trailed for nearly the entire game and fell behind by eight points with just 1:30 to play before a three-point play by senior forward Kelsey Kahle cut the lead to just five.

Missed free throws by the Wolverines, offensive rebounds, and some timely shooting from freshman guard Eryn Jones gave the Vikings an opportunity to tie trailing 82-79 with under a minute to play.

After a busted play, sophomore post Courtney Cremer found herself with the ball at the top of the circle and launched a desperation three-pointer from well behind the men's arc. It was just her fourth attempt of the season but Cremer's prayer banked in (although judging from her reaction, it wasn't called).

A shot by the aforementioned Asumi Nakayama was off and the teams headed to overtime.

Despite blowing the lead in the waning moments of regulation the Wolverines regrouped and dominated the overtime period outscoring the Vikings 20-10. The victory improved Utah Valley's record to 4-7 and dropped Portland State to 8-4. Two of the Vikings losses have come in overtime.

It was Portland State's final tune-up before the Big Sky season play begins later this week, but the team looked anything but well-oiled in their non-conference finale. Point guard Claire Faucher struggled all game and finished with just five points on two for 10 shooting.

It was unclear if Sherri Murrell was experimenting with a different lineup, giving some of her starters some rest before the conference stretch run or reacting to lackluster performances from some of her starters but the head coach went with an unconventional strategy down the stretch. 10 Portland State players played more than 10 minutes.

With Faucher out of the game the Vikings would have struggled mightily were it not for the performance of Kahle. She finished the game with 30 points which included a 12 for 12 performance from the charity stripe. She also had four rebounds, four assists and three steals.

The Vikings certainly were lucky to find themselves even in the game after committing 13 costly turnovers and shooting 36 percent from the field and 27 percent from the three point arc.

Even more discouraging for Viking fans is the fact that this team, again, gave up more than 100 points to Utah State. The Vikings will likely face far more talented teams in Big Sky opponents Montana, Montana State and Northern Colorado.

In Monday's game the Vikings inability to get stops on the defensive end forced them into playing a fast-tempo shooting match with the Wolverines. Normally with Faucher at the helm this would seem like a winning idea. But the honorable mention All-American player was on the bench.

With inexperienced, and often tired-looking players, on the court, the Vikings looked like a team that still has some growing pains to experience.

Portland State will face Sacramento State and Northern Arizona this weekend.

PSU women trail Utah Valley at the half

With the men's squad out of town tonight, no good bowl games to watch I decided to watch the Vikings take on Utah Valley in the Stott Center.

The result so far: unimpressive.

Taking on a squad that they gave up 104 points to in a game last season in Orem, Utah, the Vikings have yet to play solid defense on two consecutive Wolverine possessions.


Utah Valley is in their final year of transitioning to become a full-fledged member of Division I. They seem to be making a good go of it. I know they have fielded competitive men's and women's basketball squads this season. This comes less than 10 years after serving as a junior college feeder school to BYU, Utah and Utah State.

Back to the game-

Attendance is pretty scarce. I am not going to bail out the students on this one. It seems weird sitting on press row and being able to hear every cheer, complaint and comment from either bench. I guess I have been attending to many men's games.

Freshman point guard Eryn Jones started her third consecutive game and has played well although I have not quite figured out the logic to head coach Sherri Murrell's rotation yet. She seems to be favoring her bench heavily and point guard Claire Faucher and wing Katia Hadj-Hamou have yet to look comfortable on the floor.

It has been interesting to watch the development of former walk-on Kate DePaepe. After a solid career at Tualatin High and playing sparingly in nine games last season the southpaw is serving as one of the more consistent performers coming off the bench this year replacing some of the scholarship players that she played behind last season.

The Vikings have kept the game close thanks in large part to Kelsey Kahle's 14 points but have hindered their own ability to come back by missing several close-range layups. they have also committed dozens of turnovers. (I do not know the actual number but I do know they have been very careless with the ball)

I am not sure if it's the post-Christmas spirit kicking in but the dainty crowd is all over the referee's here. The zebra's aren't helping themselves either, missing a few painfully obvious calls.

One fashion note for you uniform heads... I know that this is small college women's basketball but Utah Vally looks more like a high-school team than any I have ever seen. Maybe it's the font on their jerseys... They are also all wearing some sort of black knee-pads. Not quite as big as the ones that Patrick Ewing used to wear but nonetheless interesting.

The Wolverines aslo feature a 5-4 point guard from Saitama, Japan. Reading from her bio she isn't some exchange student or someone who prepped in the United States, (a la Donotas Visockis) she is actually from Japan and led her team to the National Championship in high school.

I point this out because the player, Asumi Nakayama, is wearing the first pair of Asics basketball shoes I have ever seen. Besides being pretty unique they stick out like a sore thumb in contrast to the rest of hte players Nike's and Addidas'.

PSU athletic department takes down the Vanguard

As we reported on our blog several weeks ago, the athletic department took on the Vanguard sports staff in a friendly game of roundball. The results were not good....

Not good if you root for the Vanguard I mean.

To be honest, the sports staff was without one of their finest players and took the court with a lineup of a couple of solid players that had never really played together.

We also featured one Vanguard vagabond, a former arts and culture editor, who admittedly had not strapped up his high-tops in three years.

The athletic department staff... well they certainly had their numbers. Beyond Torre Chisholm and Zack Wallace (pictured) the staff also brought assistant athletic trainer Duane Dewey, sports information bigman Ryan Borde and head equipment man Rick McReynolds to the game.

Their depth eventually took its toll on the beleaguered Vanguard staff. We couldn't hit a shot, couldn't play good defense and probably were doubled up in the rebound department.

The game certainly had its intense moments, (although it probably wasn't as bad as this) but all in all, sportsmanship and camaraderie were the key themes.

The athletic department also brought in a ringer- well kind of. Jeff Boone who is the student leader of the fan group "The Horde" also played. I play with Jeff on the same intramural team and was worried he might be a difference maker. He was.

We should have known there was trouble brewing when at the last moment Chisholm moved the game from the main gym in the Stott Center to the smaller and more dimly lit small gym downstairs and eliminated the main scoreboard one of the big-game elements he had promised us...

There will likely be a rematch at some point, so I don't want to give away the scouting report although I will give you one little tidbit.

Torre Chisholm= not half bad.

The man known in the Vanguard newsroom as "T-Chis" can scrap down low in the paint. This despite his affinity for wearing some unusually short shorts.

Certainly not as short as Washington tight end Chris Cooley, who sported these during Redskins' training camp, thankfully, but short nonetheless. I even heard one of his teammates wondering under the breath if the athletic director was just playing in his boxer shorts.

Anyhow be sure to stay tuned to the blog for more Portland State sports news...

Gonzaga who? Vikings take down #7 ranked Bulldogs

Sad to admit this, and I feel like the current weather situation is one of the few excuses that would keep the sports staff at the Vanguard from doing their job, but we were not able to make it to Spokane for the huge game on Tuesday.

Nevertheless, the Vikings earned their first victory over Gonzaga in 31 years and Portland State's biggest victory since joining the Division I ranks.

The Vikings battled the odds and made Gonzaga look ordinary on Tuesday night. Senior point guard Jeremiah Dominguez looked as good as anybody that has ever played on The Kennel court and somehow head coach Ken Bone and co. motivated the troops to a huge victory.

Some Notes:
--The Vikings won without playing a perfect game. While Dominguez was terrific and Nelson, Waters and Murray were solid, Jamie Jones did not have his best game and continues to struggle against bigger opponents.

Kyle Coston was a non-factor as was his replacement Tyrell Mara. On the other side of the coin, Julius Thomas played great with a ton of energy and the performances of the four perimeter players was enough to overcome.

--Coming into the game and thus far this season much had been said about the depth of the Bulldogs and rightfully so. Gonzaga has at least six players on the roster that could play somewhere professionally and a couple with a good chance to end up in the league.

But somehow the Vikings mitigated that strength tonight. While I often question Bone's frequent substitution pattern, it looked terrific. The fresh bodies seemed to confuse Gonzaga or at least slow their powerful offense down.

-- Everyone is talking about how easy it would have been for Bone to ask Gonzaga coach Mark Few to reschedule the game or just cancel it based on the travel difficulties. But Bone knew that if they were to reschedule, it would likely be when Gonzaga school was in session, meaning that the Gonzaga students would be making their presence felt.

I don't think that the Vikings would have gotten blown out because of the crowd, but the game would have certainly had a different vibe.

--I know that the game was only televised on Fox Sports Northwest and there probably were not a lot of Portland State fans who even made time for the game, let alone your average Joe plumber...

But please, please, can we get some professional announcers to call games. Is it Fox Sports Northwest or Fox Sports Washington/Gonzaga.

Honestly, I can handle the homerism.

But what is hard to take is the constant mispronunciation of names: calling Jeremiah Dominguez Jr Dominguez, mistaking Tyrell Mara for Phil Nelson on occasion and there were surely other announcer goof-ups.

--Portland State looked ultra sharp in their green jerseys. The Vikings got all new basketball jerseys this year and have white, black and green to choose from. I have been waiting for the squad to bust the green's out as it seems like the school's main color has been bypassed by Glanville's preference for black. I could not find a picture of the green jersey's but they are similar in shade and style to Michigan State which you can see here.