Montana
Northern Arizona
Lady Griz ride defense to 60-48 win
1/12/2012 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Jan. 12, 2012
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Junior Katie Baker recorded her 10th career double-double and the Lady Griz defense had another shutdown performance in Montana's 60-48 victory over Northern Arizona Thursday night at Dahlberg Arena in Missoula, Mont.
Baker finished with 18 points and 10 rebounds, her third double-double in the last five games, and the Lumberjacks' leading scorer, Amy Patton, was limited to a single field goal as Montana lowered its scoring defense to a mere 50.7 points through three Big Sky Conference games.
Montana (9-7, 2-1 BSC) never trailed in the game and built a 32-19 halftime lead behind a relatively hot shooting half of 43.8 percent.
That offense was nowhere to be found the opening 12 minutes of the second half. The Lady Griz opened the half making just a pair of baskets, both coming from redshirt freshman Kellie Cole, in the first dozen minutes.
Cole's three at 16:12 gave Montana its largest lead of the game, 35-21, but the Lumberjacks (5-12, 0-5 BSC), who entered the game winless in Big Sky play, kept chipping away at the lead.
A jumper in the paint by NAU's Aubrey Davis capped a 9-1 run that made it 36-30. A free throw by junior Alyssa Smith and another jumper by Cole pushed the lead back to nine, 39-30, with 12:44 remaining.
The Lumberjacks' Amanda Frost started another scoring spurt with a 3-pointer. Erikka Banks followed with a basket, and when Patton, who entered the game averaging 13.7 points, hit her only basket, a three at the 8:00 mark, the lead was down to one, 39-38.
With the shot clock on Montana's next possession under 10 seconds, sophomore Torry Hill answered Patton's lone three with her own single deep ball of the game, giving the Lady Griz some breathing room at 42-38.
With the road upset within reach, NAU promptly missed its next six shots, and Montana got scoring from Cole and Baker and a three from sophomore Jordan Sullivan to extend the lead back to 12, 50-38, with just under three minutes remaining.
Its scoring drought was too much to overcome, and Northern Arizona could get no closer than eight points in the final two minutes.
Montana made just six second-half baskets and shot 27.3 percent the final 20 minutes.
"I thought we played pretty well the first half," UM coach Robin Selvig said.
"Then the first 12 or 13 minutes of the second half, we just couldn't get anything going. We turned it over, and we couldn't make any shots. Then we finally made some big baskets at the end.
"But through it all they never really did get any runs that cost us and only scored 48 points. Once again it was probably our defense that did the bulk of the work for us."
Baker and Cole combined for 34 of the team's 60 points and hit 12 of their 23 shots. Baker was 7 for 12 and scored 18 points; Cole went 5 for 11, hit a pair of threes and finished with 16 points, a season high.
The rest of the team shot 8 for 31, and no other player scored more than six points.
Smith had nine rebounds and three assists, Sullivan seven rebounds and junior Kenzie De Boer five steals, giving the Big Sky Conference's most disruptive menace 13 steals the last three games.
Patton and Shay May both had 10 points and nine rebounds for Northern Arizona, which shot 33.3 percent. Patton, who had five of her team's 21 turnovers, scored seven of her points from the line.
Montana will host Weber State (2-15, 0-4 BSC) Saturday at 2 p.m. The Wildcats lost at Montana State (10-6, 2-2 BSC) Thursday, 64-61.
Notes: Freshman Maggie Rickman did not suit up for Thursday's game. She hyperextended a knee recently and is questionable for Saturday's game. ... De Boer missed her first free throw attempt of the game late in the second half when the Lumberjacks started fouling to extend time. That ended De Boer's consecutive makes streak from the line at 24. ... Northern Arizona, at 56.8 percent, entered the game as one of the nation's worst free throw shooting teams. The Lumberjacks went 12 for 13 (.923). ... In other Big Sky Conference games Thursday, Eastern Washington (10-8, 4-1 BSC) won at home over Sacramento State (7-10, 2-2 BSC), 78-62, and Portland State (11-5, 3-1 BSC) came back from a 36-29 halftime deficit at home to defeat Northern Colorado (10-7, 2-2 BSC), 62-61.
