The Snow College men’s basketball team picked up a valuable road win in the Scenic West Athletic Conference by knocking off the Eagles of Utah State University-Eastern in Price, 87-73, on Thursday.
The Badgers led most of the way after the lead changed hands twice in the early going. USU-E had their largest lead of one point with a little over two minutes gone in the first half before Snow College got the lead back and held on for the rest of the game.
“We shot the ball about as well as we have for a while,” said Snow’s Coach Rob Nielson. “I think we moved the ball well and made the adjustments we needed to in order to get good looks at the basket.”
Snow College shot almost 60 percent from the field for the game and 5 percent from beyond the three-point arc. Hagen Wright and Wyatt Lowell led the Badgers with 22 points; Chase Potter scored 21 points and Drake Allen pitched in 11 points and 13 assists. Rich Stucki came off the bench to spark the Badgers in the paint with 4-4 shooting and eight points.
“This was a big win for us on the road,” said Nielson. “USU-E is very talented and they play well and have some big wins so far. This was good for us to try and position ourselves for the post-season tournament.”
The Badgers then lost some of that momentum on Saturday, when they came out slow against the College of Southern Idaho and fell behind by as many as 18 points in the first half, eventually trailing by 12 at the half and losing 79-85.
“We didn’t have the defensive intensity that we needed,” said Nielson. “We gave them way too many open looks to start the game and you can’t get behind and expect to come back against a good team like CSI.”
From the first media timeout in the first half to the second media time out the Badgers were outscored 20-10 and eventually had to battle just to get the deficit down to 12 at the half.
The second-half Badgers were a completely different team, outscoring the Golden Eagles 26-9 to start the half and had a six-point lead with 8:51 remaining. Another scoring drought allowed CSI to mount their comeback and take the lead and eventual win.
Wyatt Lowell again led the Badgers in scoring with 26 points, including 7-11 from three-point range. Drake Allen finished with 22 points and seven assists. Clayton Southwick fouled out of the game with 11 points. The Badgers finished with 40 points in the paint but came up just short.
Snow College will host USU-E on Thursday at 7 p.m. with the game live on KMTI-AM 650 from the Horne Activity Center on the Snow College Campus.
