The Eagles had yet another rally, but Northern Colorado's hot shooting in the first half was too much to overcome.
 
The Bears sank 64 percent of their shots to open a 19-point lead at halftime and beat Eastern Washington University 75-63 in a Big Sky Conference men's basketball game Monday (Jan. 7) at the Bank of Colorado Arena in Greeley.
 
Eastern had a 14-2 run in the second half to cut into a Bears lead that had ballooned to 58-34 with 11:04 left in the contest. Eastern cut the lead to a dozen with 4:52 left, and five more times after that. But the Bears never relinquished its double-digit lead and closed out the game with a basket and two free throws by Jordan Davis, who finished with a game-high 30 points.
 
"We have the culture of playing hard," said Eastern head coach Shantay Legans. "We have 13 or 14 players who can make plays, and there are going to be injuries and lulls during the season. But you always have to play hard and I have to figure out a way for our players to play hard for 40 minutes and not go through those lulls. We can't put our heads down when teams make a run on us."
 
The loss dropped Eastern to 3-12 overall and 1-3 in the Big Sky, as well as 0-of-9 on the road this season. The Bears are the only unbeaten team left in the Big Sky at 4-0, and are 10-5 overall. The Eagles were coming off a similar roller-coaster of a ride at Idaho on Jan. 3, falling 74-71 despite scoring runs by EWU of 16-9, 11-2 and 15-4.
 
Junior Mason Peatling led the Eagles with 19 points, nine rebounds, two assists, two steals and a pair of blocked shots. Senior Jesse Hunt chipped in 12 points and five boards, and junior Tyler Kidd came off the bench to spark the Eagles with 10 points and four assists.
 
Eastern had carved out an early 11-10 lead with 13:41 left in the first half. But EWU was out-scored 35-15 the rest of the half, including a 23-7 run by UNC in the final seven minutes to give UNC a 45-26 advantage at intermission.
 
"We have to put the ball in the hole," added Legans. "At the end of the day, that's what we need to do."
 

Records . . .
 
* The Eagles are 3-12, and 1-3 in Big Sky Conference play. Eastern started league play in full health after Mason Peatling made his season debut as a starter versus Corban in a 92-73 Eagle win on Dec. 21. That victory had snapped a six-game losing streak with the first five on the road. Eastern beat Idaho State 65-55 on Dec. 31 for its lone league win thus far.
 
* The Bears are 10-5 overall and are the lone unbeaten in the Big Sky at 4-0 after opening with road wins at Sacramento State (70-65) and Portland State (73-60). Northern Colorado then edged Idaho 83-79 in overtime in Greeley last Saturday (Jan. 5) after rallying from a 41-35 halftime deficit.
 
* Senior 6-2 guard Jordan Davis is the Big Sky's leading scorer at 24.9 points per game, and is also averaging 5.7 rebounds and 4.6 assists. Besides the 30 he scored against EWU, he paved the way with 29 points, nine boards and five assists against the Vandals. Bodie Hume, a 6-6 freshman guard with an 11.9 scoring average, scored 21 versus EWU with four 3-pointers.
 
 
What's Next . . .
 
* Eastern returns home for a pair of home games against the Montana schools – but they come 10 days apart. Eastern plays Montana (3-1 Big Sky, 10-5 overall) on Jan. 10 at Reese Court at 6:05 p.m., then hosts Montana State (3-1, 6-8) on Jan. 19 at 2:05 p.m. Both of those games will be televised live regionally by SWX.
 
* Like UNC, Montana features an offense with four players averaging in double figures in scoring while leading the league in field goal percentage (48.7 percent) and field goal percentage defense (41.9). The Grizzlies, who defeated EWU 82-65 in last year's championship game of the Big Sky Tournament, had their 20-game home winning streak snapped when they lost to Portland State in overtime 77-74. That followed league wins over Northern Arizona (86-73), Southern Utah (87-76) and Sacramento State (87-56).
 
* Jamar Akoh, a 6-8 senior forward, averages 16.6 points and 9.1 rebounds per game, but has played in just eight of the team's 15 games. He's averaging a double-double in four league games thus far at 20.0 and 10.5 per game. Senior guards Ahmaad Rorie (15.7 points, 3.7 rebounds and 3.5 assists) and Michael Oguine (13.8, 5.3, 2.0) have also been impressive this season, and 6-5 junior guard Sayee Pridgett chips in averages of 11.7, 4.1 and 1.9.
 

Top Performers . . .
 
* Junior Mason Peatling led Eastern with 19 points on 9-of-14 shooting from the field, plus had nine rebounds, two assists, two steals and two assists. He had his 18th career game scoring in double figures, and came a rebound shy of the sixth double-double of his career and first this season.
* Senior Jesse Hunt had 12 points and five rebounds. He made 5-of-6 free throws but was just 4-of-13 from the field. Hunt entered the game with four double-doubles on the season and five in his career.  He has now had 19 career double-figure scoring performances in his career to go along with eight performances with 10 or more rebounds.
* Junior guard Tyler Kidd was the third Eagle in double figures, scoring 10 in just 16 minutes off the bench. He hit 4-of-9 shots from the field and also had four assists.
 

Key Stats . . .

* Eastern is being out-shot 46.9 percent to 38.9 percent overall this season, including 39.6 percent to 30.9 percent from the 3-point stripe. And that continued versus UNC as EWU was out-shot 52.1 percent to 39.3 percent. The Bears made 9-of-24 3-point attempts for 37.5 percent, compared to a 4-of-13 performance by the Eagles at 30.8 percent. Eastern out-rebounded UNC by one (32-31) and had one more turnover as well (13-12).
 
  
Notables . . .

* The Eagles are 11-12 all-time versus UNC (8-3 in Cheney, 3-9 in Greeley), with the first meeting taking place on Dec. 20, 1971, when Eastern beat the Bears 76-68 in Greeley, Colo. Since then, all of the meetings have been with EWU as a member of NCAA Division I (since 1983-84), starting in the 2006-07 season when the Bears became a Big Sky Conference member. Despite the 75-63 loss in Greeley, Eastern has won three of the last five meetings and six of the last nine. The Eagles won in Cheney 67-65 on Jan. 27, 2018, less than a month after losing in Greeley 88-75. The teams met just once in the 2016-17 season and EWU won that 70-44 in Greeley.
 
* Eastern will put a 3-3 home record on the line against Montana at Reese Court on Thursday. The Eagles are 49-9 overall there in the last four-plus seasons (84 percent). In the previous four seasons, EWU has gone 46-6 at Reese Court, including an 11-1 mark last season and 15-1 record in 2016-17.
 
 
Comments from Head Coach Shantay Legans . . .

 On First-Half Run by UNC: "We've been working on looking at lineups and who is in at those times. We have to figure out who can go in and stop a run. Tonight, just like the Idaho game, we let it get away from us by missing some easy ones again. We let their freshmen come in and hit some threes, and that's tough. We really keyed on Jordan in the first half and gave up some threes trying to take something away. They did a good job of spreading us out and making us chase them."
 
On Rebounding Edge Versus UNC: "I love Mason and Jesse in the post, and we have guards who can go down there and rebound. We have to use our athleticism to get on the glass, especially with Montana coming in on Thursday. They are a good team and play similar to Northern Colorado. They have really good bigs and guards who can really go. We have to step up and play the right way. We have to make sure we are doing all the right things and doing them at the right times. Right now we want to get the ball inside to Mason and Jesse to get to the free throw line and do a good job of beating opponents inside. Then those outside shots will fall. We just have to get some momentum going our way."