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Bulldogs thunder 'Jackets

Big second half gives Gonzaga win

Jim Meehan  •  Staff writer
Published November 16, 2008

MSUB's Mario Burns meets GU's Josh Heytvelt and Austin Day. Associated Press (Associated Press )

Gonzaga built two large leads against Montana State University-Billings – one it nearly frittered away and one that kept getting larger.

The latter trumped the former – an unsightly 3-minute spell at the end of the first half in which MSUB's Mike Hall scored every point in a 14-0 run – as the No. 10 Bulldogs dominated the second half en route to an 83-52 season-opening men's basketball win Saturday in front of a sellout crowd of 6,000 at the McCarthey Athletic Center.

Gonzaga was in command, 33-14, after Josh Heytvelt scored inside with 3:38 remaining. But Hall struck for three straight 3-pointers, a midrange jumper and three free throws. Just like that, Gonzaga's lead was down to 33-28, and sophomore guard Steven Gray was expecting to hear an earful in the locker room.

"No, it actually wasn't nearly as much as I was expecting," Gray said. "We had done a really solid job up until (the last 3 minutes), so we just said, 'Stick to the game plan, that's what got us the lead.' We sort of deviated from that at the end of the half."

In fact, head coach Mark Few chewed himself out a little bit.

"I thought we got off to a very good start," he said. "The last five minutes, partly because I wanted to play everybody in the first half, we kind of had a bad zone lineup in there that ordinarily doesn't play together. That's my fault.

"But to (the Yellowjackets') credit, they stepped up. The Hall kid really hit some big-time shots."

Hall's second game at the McCarthey Athletic Center was nothing like his first. A year ago as a member of the Idaho Vandals, Hall was scoreless in 10 minutes. After the season, he followed ex-Vandals coach George Pfeifer to Montana State-Billings. He scored 32 points in an exhibition win over Dickinson State earlier this week.

Hall finished with 24 points, including five 3-pointers, a couple with defenders in his face. He was limited to 2-of-7 shooting in the second half and had four turnovers.

Gonzaga scored 22 of the first 29 points in the second half to build a comfortable 20-point lead. Austin Daye, after a shaky couple of minutes late in the first half, scored eight of his 15 points during the run. Heytvelt, who finished with 15 points, and Jeremy Pargo each chipped in five.

"We played a lot harder (in the second half) than we did in the last few minutes of the first half," Heytvelt said. Gonzaga outscored the NCAA Division II Yellowjackets 50-24 in the second half.

Daye finished with his second career double-double (15 points, 12 rebounds). His first came in last year's season opener versus Montana. Matt Bouldin added 12 points and Micah Downs had nine. Pargo contributed 10 assists and no turnovers. True freshman Demetri Goodson had a nice stretch midway through the second half, hitting a driving layup, drawing a charging foul and then finishing on the break after a midair touch pass from Pargo.

Nine Bulldogs scored at least six points.

"I think that's what we're going to see, the minutes were dispersed about the way we'd like it," said Few, whose team entertains Idaho on Tuesday. "That's kind of our strength. I don't think we're going to have a guy that can go out and consistently get 25, 30 (points). This group has really bought into sharing the ball."

Gonzaga finished with 10 blocked shots – four by Daye, three by Heytvelt – and a 44-31 edge in rebounding. The Bulldogs committed 10 of their 12 turnovers in the first half.

Percentages: FG .327, FT .647. 3-Point Goals: 5-19, .263 (Hall 5-12, Burns 0-1, Taylor 0-1, Hodge 0-1, Bunker 0-4). Team Rebounds: 9. Blocked Shots: 1 (Burns). Turnovers: 18 (Burns 5, Hall 4, Team 4, Wright 2, Bunker, Ruff, Birky). Steals: 4 (Bunker, Wright, Hall, Taylor). Technical Fouls: None.

Percentages: FG .477, FT .813. 3-Point Goals: 8-27, .296 (Sorenson 2-2, Bouldin 2-5, Heytvelt 1-1, Pargo 1-3, Gray 1-5, Downs 1-6, Goodson 0-1, Daye 0-4). Team Rebounds: 0. Blocked Shots: 10 (Daye 4, Heytvelt 3, Bouldin, Gray, Brown). Turnovers: 12 (Daye 4, Heytvelt 2, Goodson 2, Bouldin, Downs, Gray, Foster). Steals: 6 (Bouldin 2, Downs, Goodson, Sorenson, Gray). Technical Fouls: None.

Halftime–Gonzaga 33, Montana State-Billings 28. A–6,000.