Last season, Idaho and Wright State met in a drama-filled contest decided by multiple buzzer-beaters of ESPN Sports Center Top-10 proportions.
Philip Vukelich | Argonaut
Vandal forward Stephen Madison drives to the basket during the first half of Friday’s game against Wright State in Memorial Gym. The Vandals lost 80-70 against the Raiders in their first regular season game.
This season the game was decided by Idaho turning the ball over early and often, giving Wright State a lead it would never relinquish.
The Vandals fell to the Raiders 80-70 at Memorial Gym in its 2012-13 season opener.
“Basically they beat us in every phase of the game tonight. They came in here and out pressured us, they pressured us out of our offensive sets,” Idaho coach Don Verlin said. “We turned it over in the first half for easy baskets, gave them the lead and just could never climb back in to it.”
Kyle Barone led Idaho on the night with 18 points and nine rebounds, while shooting guard Connor Hill had a game-high four assists.
Idaho jumped out to an 8-2 lead before turnover problems kicked in. Starting point guard Mike McChristian turned the ball over twice within a minute, allowing Wright State to tie the game.
“It was probably the difference in the game. We knew that was how they were going to play us,” Verlin said. “Mike (McChristian) came out because of it. Against a good team you have to take care of the ball better and we didn’t do that.”
Ten total first-half turnovers allowed Wright State 11 more field goal attempts than Idaho, en route to a 40-29 halftime lead for the Raiders.
Idaho turned the ball over only three times in the second half, which helped the Vandals cut Wright State’s lead to as little as five points, but getting over the hump would prove to be the problem.
“It seemed like every time we’d cut to within five, six, seven points they would just pick and pop a three,” shooting guard Hill said. “It was pretty frustrating. That’s our defense, we have to get better on close outs and everything else.”
Wright State shot a pedestrian 36-percent from beyond the arc, but it was off 25 attempts. The Raiders seemed to have a knack for draining threes when momentum was threatening to shift Idaho’s way. Three times within the first 10 minutes of the second half Idaho cut the lead to under 10, only to have Wright State hit a 3-point shot to keep the game out of reach.
Defensively the Vandals struggled to get out on the shooters — Many of Wright State’s misses were still open shots. In the second half big men such as Barone and Wendell Faines were stretched out to the perimeter to help on close outs.
“I think they got us in situations when we were helping on the screens and had to chase back to the three-point line, and we’re in a bad position right away. We have to clean that up a little bit,” Barone said.
The Vandals will get a week to clean those problems up before hosting Montana, which was picked to win the Big Sky regular season championship.
“Got to give Wright State all the credit. For whatever reason we weren’t on the level we needed to be tonight. They’re good. I told everybody all along, this is the best schedule we’ve had,” Verlin said.
Sean Kramer can be reached at [email protected]