BILLINGS, Mont. (March 2) — The Central Washington University men's basketball team completed a very successful 2014-15 Great Northwest Athletic Conference (GNAC) regular season with a 12-6 conference mark and 17-8 overall record. Two of the Wildcats' losses came to Northwest Nazarene University (NNU) (11-7 GNAC, 13-14 overall).
Game notes. Ironically, CWU will face NNU in the quarterfinals of the 2015 GNAC Men's Basketball Championships Thursday in Alterowitz Gymnasium at Montana State University Billings, with tip off slated for 4:15 p.m. (Pacific Standard Time).
"Since we played them just a little while back, we only have to plug a couple of more things into the scouting report, go over their stuff and get ready to play," said CWU head coach
Greg Sparling. "We just need to get focused."
The Crusaders won the first meeting of the season 74-67 in Ellensburg. In that Jan. 3 meeting, in Nicholson Pavilion, NNU held CWU to just 32.3 percent field goal shooting and outrebounded the Wildcats 50-29. Crusaders' guard Erik Kinney scored 25 points and grabbed nine rebounds to lead his team to the upset.
NNU followed that with a 66-64 home triumph in Nampa, Idaho. In the rematch, Jan. 31, Central trailed by two points with 3.6 seconds left when Central guard
Dom Williams took the in-bounds pass and sped down floor. It looked like he was going to take the final Wildcat shot. Instead, he spotted center
Joseph Stroud open on the other side of the key and made a lob pass in his direction. Stroud went up to catch the pass to dunk it for the tie. But it glanced off his fingertips, as time expired. The dunk would have capped a remarkable comeback for CWU, which was down 64-58 with 1:24 left in the game.
Those losses could provide extra motivation heading into the playoff matchup.
"I think our guys are pretty fired up to play them," acknowledged Sparling. "When we played at home, I thought we let one get away. I thought, down there, we played pretty good—not great. But we had our opportunities to win."
Despite the earlier losses, CWU has won 28 of the previous 41 meetings in the all-time series. In neutral floor meetings, as will be the case Thursday, the Wildcats have won four of five games with the Crusaders, the last in 1999.
In the other quarterfinal game Thursday, Alaska Anchorage takes on Western Washington.
"That's going to be a game!" said Sparling. "If I'm going to give an advantage, I'm going to give it to Western, because Anchorage is having to travel all the way here and because of the way Western is playing right now [eight straight wins]."
If CWU is to advance into the NCAA Division II West Regional tournament, they will, likely, need to win the GNAC tournament. That means the Wildcats will have to win three games in three days.
"If we run our crew like we have been the first night, the second night there might not be too much in the tank," admitted Sparling. "We're going to be smart on how we sub [substitute], we're going to have to rest some guys and make sure we get the first W [win]. Then we can figure out the second game."
That second game would be against Seattle Pacific University. The Wildcats lost to the Falcons, 69-47, in Seattle last Thursday after winning the first meeting of the teams, 73-67, in Ellensburg in December.
Eight teams will play for the NCAA regional championship playoffs March 13-16 at a site still to be determined. It will feature the champions of the GNAC, California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) and the PacWest Conference.
The other five teams, that are not the conference titlists, will be determined through rankings based on the official NCAA West Regional poll. The final regional rankings will be released on Wednesday. The Wildcats were not listed among the region's Top-10 last week.
While in Billings, the Wildcats will also be involved in some community service Wednesday. They will visit a local elementary school to read to the students, play with them on the playground and hold question-and-answer session for them.
"A lot of these [elementary] kids have dreams of playing collegiate athletics," Sparling pointed out. "It's nice for them to get to see that all 12 of our players are students first and athletes second. It's also good for our university, it's good our program and it's good for our kids, for them to give back what other people have given to them."
