Editor’s Note: Brooks Nuanez contributed to the reporting of this story.
BOZEMAN, Montana — Danny Sprinkle wanted his team to have to compete with tired legs in their lone home game of a truncated non-conference schedule.
Mission accomplished.
The Bobcats looked low on energy and sluggish defensively in allowing a Yellowstone Christian College team that scored 42 points in a 60-point loss at Montana on Saturday afternoon to score 40 points in the first half alone at Brick Breedefn Fieldhouse 24 hours later.
In the second half, Montana State played better defensively and did what it wanted on offense on the way to a 114-74 victory in a mostly empty arena, marking the home debut for a collection of Bobcats as MSU moved to 2-1 this season.
“We’ve been going hard and we have been cleaning up the things that we have to,” said MSU junior guard Mike Hood, a transfer from Southern Idaho, who is one of 10 new players on this Bobcat roster. “This really does feel like a training camp and we are ready to really kick off the season.”
Yellowstone Christian, a tiny private Bible college from Billings that has roughly 40 students enrolled, played with great confidence and vigor the first 15 minutes of Sunday’s game despite playing its fourth game this week. The Centurions hit eight first-half 3-pointers, keeping the deficit in single digits for most of the first 20 minutes.
Devin Jones, Derrian Reed and TJ Rivera each hit three 3-pointers as the visitors hit 13 shots from beyond the arc overall. Jones finished with 20 points, Reed had 19, Andrii Basovets had 14 points and Rivera scored 13 as YCC got past clearly gassed Bobcat defenders most of the afternoon.
“It was sloppy,” Sprinkle said. “You have to give Yellowstone credit: they made 13 3-pointers and most of them were off the dribble. They were just squaring guys up and making shots. They were aggressive, their pace was really good in the first half and we weren’t ready for that.
“I know why they were tired but we still have to be better than that. From a discipline standpoint, we weren’t very disciplined. We will rectify that tomorrow morning.”
Sprinkle, Montana State’s second-year head coach, knew the time between his team’s overtime loss at Pacific on December 2 and its next game at Washington State on December 18 would be a crucial stretch for his team to improve their conditioning and execution.
Playing without senior point guard Xavier Bishop (lower leg injury) and junior combo guard Amin Adamu (concussion), the Bobcats struggled to find a flow. In the first half, Yellowstone Christian used an unorthodox defense in which they defended in the post by playing in front and behind MSU big men Jubrile Belo and Devin Kirby.
“That was smart by their coaching staff to do that with Jubrilie,” Sprinkle said. “They didn’t have anyone his size or strength. They were doubling him pretty hard and daring a couple of our guys to shoot it.”
That led to a variety of errant passes as the Bobcats turned the ball over 18 times in a game Sprinkle called “sloppy” multiple times during his post-game interview. Hood, who played 28 minutes mostly on the ball, had five turnovers and true freshman Kellen Tynes, who made his first start in his home debut, had a pair.
“It was better than practicing against ourselves and I think Yellowstone exposed us in a couple areas we can show ourselves on film and we can improve on,” Sprinkle said. “Kind of like the Pacific game (a 74-70 overtime loss), sometimes, you have to go through those experiences in order to correct those.
“I’m glad it happened to us now in a winning situation. I’d rather teach off a win than teach off a loss. I think they got our guys’ attention and they got better from it.”
A 53-23 advantage on the glass and 11 made triples helped Montana State score the most points in a home opener in program history. Hood led the Bobcats with 12 rebounds to go with 21 points, joining Abdul Mohamed (14 points, 11 rebounds) as Bobcats with their first career double-doubles.
“I hadn’t been playing too well this year so I have to turn it around, the whole team we have to turn it around and we have stuff we have to clean up,” Hood said. “I could’ve been stronger with the ball, I could’ve been more solid. There’s always something to get better at and we will.”
Belo, Montana State’s preseason All-Big Sky center, bruised his way to 20 points on 5-of-5 shooting from the floor, 10-of-12 from the free throw line in just 18 minutes of work. Tynes scored 16 points, dished out six of MSU’s 21 assists and added six rebounds in 33 minutes. Nick Gazelas, a former junior college transfer, and true freshman Tyler Patterson combined to hit five 3-pointers as part of MSU’s starting lineup for the first time together on the way to 12 and 11 points, respectively.
“When we play together and we move the ball and run our plays at a good pace, that’s when the offense clicked,” Hood said. “We just have to figure out how to do that consistently.”
YCC hit five of its 13 attempts from beyond the arc in the second half but made just four other field goals, finishing 9-of-33 from the floor after the break.
“We had a really slow start defensively,” Tynes said. “Once we started to pick that up, that led to our run outs in transition and that led to easy buckets.
“We had to take more pride on defense and not settle. Tonight, they scored way too many points but we had some good minutes of defense.”
Montana State now turns the page to prepare for two more non-conference games leading up to taking a break for Christmas. MSU plays at Washington State on December 18 and at Portland December 22. Washington State beat Portland State 69-60 on Sunday. Portland beat PSU 86-73 on December 5 and won at Oregon State, 87-86 in overtime, on Sunday afternoon.
“I was a little concerned with our 3-point shooting today because we had tired legs. It was on purpose. I wanted to grind these guys the past 10 days,” Sprinkle said. “We have to get fresh. We are going to start tomorrow morning early. But we have to get them some rest so we are ready to go on Friday.”
Photos by Brooks Nuanez. All Rights Reserved.
