RENO — Hannah Caudill sat on the Montana State bench, her face buried in a towel whenever she wasn’t walking to the end of the hardwood to talk with MSU’s trainers.
Riley Nordgaard winced in pain after two hard first quarter falls before heading to the locker room briefly with one trainer as another examined Blaire Braxton’s knee.
Peyton Ferris checked in and out of the lineup as she battled foul trouble and Weber State’s bracketing strategy. Weber State executed an unorthodox triangle-and-two defense that denied Ferris the ball both in front and behind, allowing the Big Sky Conference MVP touched the ball seven total times, including five that she earned with offensive rebounds as she managed just four shots and four points.
With the focus almost exclusively on Ferris in the paint, MSU junior Delany Junkermier saw open look after open look barely rim out as she missed 11 of her first 13 jumpers, including her first eight 3-point attempts.
For a good portion of Wednesday’s quarterfinal opener, it looked like disaster may strike twice against the two-time reigning Big Sky regular-season champions.
Montana State junior Hannah Caudill
Montana State entered this week’s Big Sky Tournament as the No. 1 overall seed after a second straight 20-win season that included 15 league victories. Last season, Idaho State flummoxed MSU in its first game, battering the Bobcats for 40 minutes before Juliet Jones drilled a half-court shot at the buzzer to end MSU’s title hopes.
Wednesday, with Caudill fighting off an undisclosed but serious illness that cost her two games, Nordgaard squinting through the pain of a rough season accentuated by no less than eight hard falls against Weber State and a second straight disappointment looming large, the Bobcats decided it was too soon to return home.
Weber State senior Deeshyra Thomas hit a floater in the lane with two minutes to play to cut MSU’s lead to 54-52 and her free throw with 87 seconds left cut MSU’s lead to one point. Unlike last season when MSU blew an eight-point lead in the final two minutes against Idaho State, the Bobcats put down the hammer to survive and advance.
Sophomore Annika Lai shook off a cold shooting day to hit a field goal with 2:50 left to push the lead to four. When Thomas cut it to one, Junkermier buried her first three with 1:13 left, sparking an 11-1 run by Montana State to seal its first Big Sky Tournament win since 2012. Caudill scored a career-high 24 points, including hitting six crucial 3-pointer and swishing six more free throws in the final 33 seconds as the top seed posted a 65-53 victory over Weber State.
“I just didn’t want to go home,” said an emotional Caudill after playing 25 gutsy minutes. “It just sucked last year. When the game started to get close, I just had flashbacks of last year and thought, ‘This is not happening.’ I brought myself together each time I checked back in, mustered all I had and went back in so we didn’t have to come home and we could stay here.”
Montana State junior Delany Junkermier
The victory is Montana State’s 23rd this season, one shy of MSU’s school record of 24 set in 1988. The Bobcats will play in the Big Sky Tournament semifinals on Friday against No. 4 Eastern Washington, a 73-64 winner over Idaho, last year’s tournament champions. MSU swept EWU this season.
“We try to separate the two teams because it is a different identity with this year’s group,” MSU 12th-year head coach Tricia Binford said. “I thought we had great momentum (four straight wins) coming in this year. These kids are tough, they are resilient by hard they are diving on the floor. They weren’t going to let this happen again.”
Caudill, the league’s leader in 3-point percentage in conference play, hit three first-quarter triples as MSU cast 12 shots from deep to build an 18-17 first quarter lead. With Ferris saddled with two early fouls and on the bench, Weber State answered right back, hitting three straight 3-pointers to open the second quarter and take a 26-18 lead.
The Weber lead reached a game-high 10 points as Montana State missed its first four looks from deep in the second quarter. Senior Margreet Barhoum came off the MSU bench to hit her first 3-point try to halt a 17-2 WSU run. Caudill’s fourth 3-pointer with a minute left in the first half capped a 7-0 MSU run as the game went to halftime tied at 31.
Montana State junior point guard Hannah Caudill
Caudill’s fifth 3-pointer gave MSU a 36-33 lead early in the second half and MSU would not trail again. But the score remained close as the rest of the Bobcats struggled to find the mark. Caudill’s fifth three came on her 10th attempt. At that moment, Junkermier was 2-of-10 from the floor and 0-of-5 from deep. Lai was 1-of-6, including 0-3 from distance. Montana State was 2-of-20 from deep outside of Caudill as the third quarter buzzer sounded with the Bobcats clinging to a 48-44 lead.
“That defense is something we have not seen the entire season,” Binford said. “I’m just extremely proud of our kids finding a way to get it done against something we haven’t seen all year. I will certainly have my kids better prepared for Friday if we see a look like that again. We went into every timeout talking about how other kids had to step up and that’s been a strength of this group all season long.”
Caudill spent most of the third quarter on the bench either clutching at her chest or with her face buried in a towel. With nine minutes to play, Nordgaard took yet another hard fall before heading to the locker room. She returned a minute later, but Ferris picked up her fourth foul soon after and checked out with 6:30 left, MSU up 50-48.
“It was pretty tough, not going to lie but I’m just going to get some more sleep and I’m sure I will feel way better on Friday,” Caudill said. “I’m glad I got through it and got the win.”
The disarray continued as MSU turned the ball over seven times in nine possessions but salty defense that limited Weber to 28 percent shooting and a spirited effort on the glass that led the Bobcats to a 54-32 rebounding advantage kept the No. 8 Wildcats at bay.
Weber Sate junior Kailie Quinn drives against Montana State’s defense
Binford took a timeout with 1:38 left and her team clinging to a 54-52 lead. She went with a lineup of Ferris, Nordgaard, Junkermier, Lai and freshman Oliana Squires that got a crucial stop that led to Junkermier’s clutch 3-pointer before inserting Caudill to seal the game from the stripe.
“This entire season, I’ve been struggling with my shooting and my coaches and teammates told me to never stop shooting so I am going to continue,” Junkermier said. “I continued to shoot and hit a big one.
“You think about the shot. That last shot I took, I was thinking about it for awhile. But you have to have confidence when you are a shooter. When you are being left that wide open, you have to shoot it.”
Weber State head coach Bethann Ord said her and her staff put together the flustering defensive game play Tuesday following Weber State’s overtime win over Sacramento State Monday. The strategy worked as Nordgaard, a second-team All-Big Sky selection, missed all five of her shots and did not score until hitting MSU’s final two free throws. Ferris, who averaged 19 points per game in league play, including scoring 24 points against Weber less than a week ago and hanging a career-best 33 on WSU on 16-of-17 shooting as a junior, finished with four points and nine rebounds in 23 minutes.
“The girls did an unbelievable job of sticking to the game plan and laying it out there on the floor,” Ord said. “I couldn’t be more proud of this group of young ladies, what they’ve been through and what they achieved.
“The plan wasn’t just to leave a shooter open. That wasn’t the mindset. It was about the other two, stopping them. Our triangle part, you saw Deeshyra going side to side, moving up and down. I thought we did a terrific job but Caudill hit some big ones.”
Montana State senior captain Riley Nordgaard
MSU earned the right to move on due in part because of 26 points from its bench. The Bobcats grabbed 21 offensive rebounds, leading to 22 second-chance points. Nordgaard led the way with her spirited, tough play, grabbing five offensive rebounds among her 13 boards. She hit the floor over and over again, inspiring the Bobcats despite some sort of injury that left her squinting and rubbing her temple during stoppages.
“It pumps people up,” Caudill said of Nordgaard’s style. “Seeing her all-out effort, it carries on throughout the entire team. Obviously, she didn’t want to go home. She was diving on the floor, doing everything she could. Her effort was everything for us.”
Binford admitted her team was tense entering their tournament debut. Getting a win in gritty fashion should help ease those nerves as Montana State tries for its first berth in the NCAA Tournament.
“It feels great to get the nerves off,” Junkermier said. “It will be great to play on Friday and not have any nerves. It’s always a big thing going out on the court first game. Weber has already played a game so they had all their nerves out.”
Photos by Brooks Nuanez. All Rights Reserved.
