For a short time, the Bengals forgot EWU was leading the Big Sky Conference in defense.
 
But the Eagles had three impressive stretches on defense, and their offense had their second-best shooting performance of the season and a 78-percent performance from the free throw line, as the Eastern Washington University men's basketball team picked up a precious league road victory by beating Idaho State 92-85 Thursday (Jan. 12) at Reed Gym in Pocatello, Idaho.
 
The Eagles used runs of 9-0 in the first half and 11-0 and 10-0 in the second half to open up comfortable leads during a 59-percent shooting night. Eastern held the Bengals scoreless for stretches of 4:09 and 5:02, and then a game-deciding stretch of 4:42 without a field goal.
 
"Road wins are happiness and we got one," said Eastern head coach Jim Hayford. "To go on the road and shoot 59 percent is impressive. I know in our pre-game talk we told them we had to shoot well, and we did shoot well. We didn't get to the line at all in the first half, but then got 23 in the second half. We're a good free throw shooting team, so we need to get to the line more. Seventy-eight percent is a good winning number."
 
Idaho State ended up making just 43 percent from the field in the second half, but had had a 12-of-17 shooting stretch in the first half that was highlighted by a stretch of eight-straight made baskets. The Bengals ended the game making eight of their last 12, but still made only 10-of-30 3-pointers in the game for 33 percent.
 
"Credit our players," said Hayford. "We challenged them to compete a little bit harder and make nothing easy for (Ethan) Telfair. He had a tougher second half and we came out of here with a good win."
 
Senior graduate transfer Jacob Wiley led the way for the Eagles with a career-high 27 points on 10-of-12 shooting from the field and 7-of-8 from the free throw line. But he picked up three fouls in the opening 1 1/2 minutes of the second half and played only 13 second-half minutes after scoring 16 points in 19 minutes in the first half.
 
Junior Bogdan Bliznyuk scored 12 of his 19 points in the second half, including all 10 in a game-deciding 10-0 run. The Eagles opened a 14-point lead with 5:41 left after the run, and led by as many as 15 and no fewer than five the rest of the way. Eastern iced the game by making 11-of-14 free throws in the last 1:47, and finished the game 18-of-23 after having entered the game ranked 12th in NCAA Division I in free throw shooting (.771).
 
After its first three league games, Eastern was leading the Big Sky in scoring defense, allowing an average of just 63.7 points per game. That included the top three defensive performances this season versus NCAA Division I foes for the Eagles, in addition to the league's best defensive shooting percentage overall (.367) and second-best from the 3-point stripe (.300).
 
On offense, Eastern entered as the top 3-point shooting team in league games only (.474) and had the second-best shooting percentage overall (.497). The Eagles finished the ISU game making 59 percent overall and sank 8-of-18 3-pointers for 44 percent.
 
 
Won-Lost Records . . .  
 
* The Eagles are now 11-6 in their 34th season as a member of NCAA Division I and 3-1 in the league as they begin their 30th season as a member of the Big Sky.  Eastern entered the game with a league-best RPI of 133, and is now 8-1 at home and 3-5 on the road.
* Idaho State is now 0-3 in the Big Sky and 3-13 overall, but in Big Sky preseason polls the Bengals were picked to finish fifth by the media (along with EWU) and were two positions ahead of Eastern in fifth by the coaches.
 
 
What It Means . . .
 
* Road wins have been a common occurrence in the Big Sky this season, and Eastern kept pace with its second of the season. Weber State, Montana, Northern Colorado, North Dakota and Southern Utah all have a pair of road breakthroughs thus far. The Wildcats are on top of the league race at 3-0, followed by North Dakota and Montana at 4-1, and EWU at 3-1.
 
 
What's Next . . .
 
* The Eagles now travel to Ogden, Utah, to play Weber State, which was picked to repeat as league champions by both the coaches and the media. The Wildcats blasted Idaho 91-66 Thursday in Ogden to improve to 3-0 in the league and 8-6 overall, with Weber State's Jeremy Senglin scoring 21 with five 3-pointers. He had entered Thursday's game ranked third in the league in scoring with a 20.4 average and has an average of 4.3 3-pointers per game to rank first in NCAA Division I.
 
 
Keys to Game . . .
 
* The Eagles shot lights-out to start the game, opening a 9-0 lead while ISU failed to score in the first 15:51. Eastern led by as many as 11 at 16-5 and ended up sinking 69 percent of its shots in the first half, including 4-of-5 3-pointers. Idaho State, however, got even hotter as the half went on, making nine of their last 10 with a streak of eight-in-a-row. Their 61 percent shooting half and 8-0 run helped them pull within 44-42 at halftime. Jacob Wiley sank 8-of-9 field goals and had 16 points in the opening 20 minutes.
 
 
Top Performers . . .
 
* Junior Bogdan Bliznyuk had 19 points, scoring 12 of them in the second half. It was the 52nd time in his 86-game career he has scored at least 10, including 11 this season. He went over the 1,000-point mark last week at home, with a current total of 1,052
* Senior graduate transfer Jacob Wiley had 16 of his 27 points in the first half, and made 17-of-20 shots in the game from the field and free throw line. He also had seven rebounds, four assists, two steals and two blocked shots after entering the game leading the league in rebounding (8.3) and blocks (2.1) per game. Wiley entered the game ranked sixth in NCAA Division I in blocked shots and 28th nationally in field goal percentage.
* Junior Sir Washington had his third double-figure scoring performance of the season and 10th of his career, making 4-of-6 shots from the field and 5-of-6 from the line to finish with 15.
* True freshman Mason Peatling had a season-high 12 points on 5-of-7 shooting. His previous high was 10 versus Northwestern. He was making his sixth start of the season after coming off the bench in the first 11.
* Senior Felix Von Hofe chipped in nine points, hitting 3-of-7 3-point attempts.
 
 
Turning Point . . .
 
* With Jacob Wiley on the bench with four fouls and Idaho State on a 6-0 run, Eastern leading scorer Bogdan Bliznyuk took over for the Eagles. He scored every point in a 10-0 run that gave EWU its biggest lead of the night at 75-61 with 5:41 to play. During that stretch, the Bengals went 3:28 without scoring and 4:42 without a field goal.
 
 
Key Stats . . .
 
* Idaho State senior guard Ethan Telfair had 12 points in the first half and nine in the first half to finish with 21 on 7-of-17 shooting from the field. He also had four rebounds, four assists and only one steal after entering the game with averages of 16.6 points (eighth in the Big Sky), 4.9 assists (third) and a league-leading 2.7 steals per game. A year ago, Telfair scored 31 points on 9-of-13 shooting from the field and 13-of-15 from the free throw line in ISU's 75-71 win over EWU in Cheney. He also had seven rebounds, seven assists and a pair of steals.
 
 
Team Highlights . . .
 
* Junior Sir Washington sparked Eastern early in the second half, scoring Eastern's first eight points and hitting a pair of 3-pointers during a 14-0 run that boosted EWU's lead to 60-50. Mason Peatling also scored six in the run. The Bengals went 5:02 without scoring during that stretch.
 
 
Notables . . .
 
* So far, EWU is 3-1 against its first five foes of the 2017 league season – all picked higher than the Eagles in the preseason coaches poll. A year ago, EWU was 1-6 versus those same five teams. Eastern will reach the one-third point of the conference season on Jan. 19 when it hosts Northern Arizona.
 
 
 
More Comments from Head Coach Jim Hayford . . .
 
On First Half and Early Second Half: "It was a game of runs. We obviously answered the opening bell really well. Then they went small and were hard to guard – they were throwing them in from everywhere. We had a two-point lead at the half, and then they started the second half pretty well. We called a timeout and adjusted to their gimmick defense where they were doubling on Jake. That left Sir all alone, and credit Sir, you have to make them and he did."
 
On Key Run in Second Half: "It was back-and-forth, then we did a great job where we ate a lot of clock and scored at the end of each possession with the ball in Bogdan's hands. He had a tough patch, but he really came through there. Fortunately we had enough points to escape all the craziness at the end. It's always tough to win on the road, as evidenced by that."