Thursday, January 8, 2015

PORTLAND, Ore. - Over the past four seasons, Western Washington has been nearly unbeatable at home winning 46 of 47 contests, including its last 10.

The lone loss (76-60) came nearly a year ago (on Jan. 15) to Seattle Pacific.  The defending GNAC champion Falcons return to Sam Carver Gym this Saturday for a regionally-televised game on ROOT Sports.

Tip-off will be at 9 p.m. (Pacific).

SPU (11-3, 3-1), which is in a three-way tie for first-place with Western Oregon (11-3, 3-1) and Alaska Anchorage (7-7, 3-1) starts the week Thursday at Simon Fraser.

Simon Fraser (6-5, 1-2) is the NCAA Division II national leaders in scoring (124.3), three-pointers made (16.2), steals (17.1), and turnover margin (11.8) and also ranks second in offensive rebounds averaging 17.4.  The Clan (5-0) are also one of two GNAC teams, along with WWU (6-0), unbeaten at home.

The Falcons are nationally ranked in four categories, including third in both field goal percentage (52.9) and rebounding (12.0), ninth in scoring margin (19.5) and 16th in scoring defense (62.3).

Western Washington (7-6 overall) was the GNAC coaches’ pre-season choice to win the conference title, but is off to a 0-3 league start losing three road games by a combined margin of 10 points including games at Alaska (64-60) and Alaska Anchorage (62-60) last weekend.

WWU, which hosts Montana State Billings (2-12, 0-4) Thursday, was a woeful 18 of 38 from the foul line in the two narrow losses.

In addition to the MSUB-WWU and SPU-SFU games, Thursday’s schedule will also match Central Washington (7-3, 2-1) and Saint Martin’s (5-9, 2-2) at Lacey and Northwest Nazarene (4-9, 2-1) and Western Oregon at Monmouth.

Alaska (5-7, 2-2) and Alaska Anchorage are idle Thursday before playing Saturday at 7 p.m. at The Patty Center.

Seattle Pacific 5th in D2SIDA Region Poll

Seattle Pacific climbed four positions to fifth place in this week’s D2SIDA Men’s Basketball regional poll after sweeping Western Oregon and Saint Martin’s.

Western Oregon, meanwhile, slipped from fourth to sixth.     Central Washington, eighth a week ago, fell out of the Top 10 after losing to Northwest Nazarene.

The poll is unofficial.  The NCAA will conduct its own official regional poll beginning in February which will determine which five teams join the GNAC, CCAA and PacWest champions in the playoffs in March.

D2SIDA West Regional Poll – 1. Azusa Pacific (13-1); 2. Cal Baptist (10-1); 3. BYU-Hawaii 9-1; 4. Cal Poly Pomona (8-3); 5. Seattle Pacific (11-3); 6. Western Oregon (11-3); 7. Point Loma (9-2); 8. Sonoma State (8-2); 9. Chico State (7-4); 10. Hawaii Pacific (7-3).

Niang Third in Assists in NCAA Statistics

Sango Niang of Simon Fraser ranks third in assists (8.00) and Anye Turner of Western Washington ranks fifth in blocked shots (3.23) in this week’s NCAA Division II national statistical report.

The two are among five players ranked in the Top 10 in this week’s report.  Joseph Stroud of Central Washington ranks seventh in blocks (2.80).  Brian McGill of Alaska Anchorage ranks eighth in assists (6.5) and Riley Stockton of Seattle Pacific is 10th in assist/turnover ratio (3.47).

Travis Thompson of Alaska Anchorage ranks 22nd in three-pointers made (3.23) and is closing in on the GNAC all-time career record.

Thompson currently ranks fourth with 258 made.  He trails current UAA women’s basketball coach Ryan McCarthy (NNU, 2002-06) by two for third place and WWU 2006 consensus All-American Grant Dykstra) by eight for second place.

Team Notes

Alaska: Ashton Edwards ranks 14th nationally in free throw shooting, making 34 of 37 (91.9) including 14 of 15 in wins last weekend over Western Washington and Simon Fraser.  In addition to Edwards (See Player of the Week notes), the Nanooks were led by Ruben Silva in their sweep of the Vikings and Clan with 36 points, 13 rebounds and four steals.

Alaska Anchorage: Sjur Berg had 21 rebounds and Kalidou Diouf had 20 rebounds in the Seawolves’ sweep of WWU and SPU as UAA outrebounded its two opponents 90-66.  Brian McGill had 48 points increasing his season scoring average to 16.9, third best in the conference.

Central Washington: The Wildcats shot just 32.3 percent in losing to Northwest Nazarene 74-67, sustaining their first home loss of the season.  NNU held the Wildcats to a 29.6 percentage from the arc (8-of-27).  Dom Williams led the Wildcats with 20 points and Jordan Russell had 15.

Montana State Billings: Momir Gataric had a double-double (14 points, 13 rebounds) in a 66-65 loss against Saint Martin’s and finished the weekend with 27 points and a team-best 18 rebounds.  Emmanuel Johnson led MSUB in scoring with 29 points, making 13 of 22 shots.

Northwest Nazarene: The Crusaders have won three of their last five games after a 1-7 start including a 74-67 win Saturday at Central Washington.  Erik Kinney scored 25 points (8-15 FGs, 9-9 FTs) and had nine rebounds to key the victory.  NNU outrebounded CWU 50-29.

Saint Martin’s:  Riley Carel scored 19 points, including eight in the final 1:59 to lead the Saints to a 66-65 road win at Montana State Billings Thursday.  In two contests, Tyler Idowu led Saint Martin’s with 26 points.

Seattle Pacific:  The Falcons, who rank third nationally in field goal percentage (52.9), shot 57.1 percent in wins over Western Oregon and Saint Martin’s, making 60 of 105.  Riley Stockton cashed in on 10 of 12, including 3-of-4 three-pointers finishing with 24 points.  He also had 13 rebounds and 10 assists.  Matt Borton led SPU with 30 points and 15 rebounds.

Simon Fraser:  Sango Niang scored 47 points and had 17 assists in a pair of losses in Alaska.  Patrick Simon netted 29 points and also had 11 rebounds.  SFU made 31 of 88 three-pointers, but were outshot 54.3 to 41.7 and outrebounded 102-74.

Western Oregon: Andy Avgi scored 42 points. Including 23 in Saturday’s 72-64 win at Montana State Billings.  Avgi shot 70.4 percent, making 19 of 27 shots.  He also had 11 rebounds as the Wolves ended the weekend as one of five GNAC teams with one conference loss each.

Western Washington:  The Vikings shot just 47.4 percent from the foul line (18-of-38) as they fell to 1-6 away from Carver Gymnasium including 0-4 on their opponents’ home courts with two losses.  WWU played the two games without starting guards Jaamon Echols and Ricardo Maxwell.  Echols ranks second in the GNAC in scoring with a 19.2 average.  Maxwell is averaging 15.5, which would rank seventh except he hasn’t played in enough games to qualify.

GNAC Men’s Basketball Players of the Week (Dec. 29-Jan. 4): Ashton Edwards, Alaska (G, Jr., Compton, CA – Long Beach CC) and Brian McGill, Alaska Anchorage (G, 6-2, Jr., Clackamas, OR – Western Oregon) …  Edwards scored 53 points including 30 in Thursday’s 64-60 home win against Western Washington and 23 in Saturday’s 121-111 victory against Simon Fraser.  Edwards made 16-of-32 field goal attempts including 7-of-12 three-pointers and 14-of-15 free throws.  He also had seven rebounds and four assists.  His point total against the Vikings represented nearly 47 percent of the Nanooks’ team total … McGill had 48 points, nine rebounds and nine assists as the Seawolves also swept SFU (108-86) and Western Washington (62-60).   McGill scored 28 points and had six rebounds in 26 minutes against the Clan Thursday and had a game-high 20 points, including the game-winning shot with 6.5 seconds left, in Saturday’s win against Western Washington. In that contest, McGill was perfect from the foul line, converting on 8-of-8 attempts.

 GNAC Weekly Report