Griz pick up where they left off at Boise

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The Montana men's basketball team will begin this season in the same place the last one ended - Boise State's Taco Bell Arena.

That's the same floor where the Griz fell 88-77 to top-seeded Washington in the first round of the NCAA tournament last March, a game in which Montana was the decided crowd favorite. The opponent Friday night will be former Big Sky Conference rival Boise State, now of the Western Athletic Conference. It's also the season opener for the Broncos, who finished 16-18 last season.

?It's pretty cool,? Montana coach Larry Krystkowiak said, ?for a lot of symbolic reasons. We probably have a little bad taste left in our mouths from being there the last time. It's a little fuel that pushed some guys through some workouts this summer. You could look at it as the end of a circle, or it could be conceived as the start of something. It's just neat.?


But any advantage the Griz might have gained from being familiar with the floor will almost certainly be wiped out by the Broncos' fans.

?It will be a little different environment than when we had 12,000 people cheering for us,? Krystkowiak said.

The Griz will likely be without junior Matt Dlouhy and redshirt freshman Jordan Hasquet. Dlouhy is recovering from a sprained ankle and Hasquet from a stress fracture in a leg. But Krystkowiak said Thursday that junior Mike Chavez, who hasn't played in a game since his freshman season of 2002-03, has regained his eligibility and will likely play against the Broncos.

?He got eligible by making up some previous work,? Krystkowiak said of Chavez, who pleaded guilty last week to his second charge of driving under the influence (see related story) since he arrived in Missoula.

Boise State struggled last season, finishing 6-12 in WAC play, good for eighth place. But the Broncos return a couple of dangerous outside threats in Eric Lane and Coby Karl, son of Denver Nuggets coach George Karl. Karl is the Broncos' leading returning scorer at 12.7 ppg and ranks eighth on the school's career list for 3-pointers despite being just a junior. Krystkowiak said he's not sure who will be matched up on Karl.

?I think first and foremost will be our ability to get back on defense,? Krystkowiak said. ?They really push the ball and look to take advantage in transition. That's going to be a big factor for us, our defensive transition, Another big factor is establishing some kind of road identity. We have to be a little more mentally strong than we would be at home.?

Boise State uses a variety of defenses.

?They keep you off guard,? Krystkowiak said. ?But other than that, it's too early in the season to know much about them. We're probably at a time where, more so than at any other time in the season, the focus is on us. We need to take care of our business and not worry about what we can't control.?

Krystkowiak said he feels good about where his team stands heading into the regular season.

?And I think the kids feel good about it, not in an overconfident kind of way,? Krystkowiak said. ?They're just secure in their own minds what direction we're heading in. A year ago I didn't realize how lost we were. We were pretty clueless. There's a little more calm than a year ago.?

NOTES: Boise State will be a measuring stick of sorts for much of the Big Sky during nonconference play. Besides Montana, the Broncos face Big Sky members Weber State (twice), Idaho State, Sacramento State and Eastern Washington. They could even face Northern Arizona at the Arizona State tournament, making Montana State and Portland State the only league teams BSU would not have faced. ... The Griz will fly from Boise to Los Angeles on Saturday for their game Monday night against Loyola Marymount. The team will watch the NBA game between the Lakers and Chicago Bulls on Sunday night, thanks to the generosity of Lakers coach Phil Jackson and Chicago coach Scott Skiles. The Griz might even attend a Lakers practice on Saturday if the schedule allows. ... This will mark the first meeting between the Griz and Broncos since Boise State left the Big Sky after the 1995-96 season.

 

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OK, Coach K, what do you do for an encore?

You'd never cut down nets in your career. Not as a player at Missoula Big Sky, the University of Montana, or in several stops in a nine-year NBA career. Nor as an assistant coach at Montana and Old Dominion, although you came close in your one year as head coach of the CBA's Idaho Stampede.



Then you arrive in Missoula to coach your alma mater and, bingo, you and your players are cutting down the nets at Portland's Memorial Coliseum after winning the Big Sky Conference men's basketball tournament. You coach the Griz into the NCAAs, just the sixth appearance in the national championship tournament in school history.

So what now?

?I'm particularly challenged by doing it again,? Griz coach Larry Krystkowiak said this week as his team prepared for its season opener Friday night at Boise State. ?The goal doesn't ever change. Looking at the history of this league, I'm not sure we've had a repeat champion in quite some time.?

In fact, the last team to go to the NCAAs in consecutive seasons was Montana in 1991-92, in Stew Morrill's final year as head coach at UM and Blaine Taylor's first.

?It's a lot like being a sophomore and getting some stuff done and getting some accolades,? Krystkowiak said. ?Then all of a sudden you're a junior and if you're going to get the same production, you better get a little bit better. You move up the scouting report a little bit.?

That's already happened. The Griz lost just one senior from the team that finished 18-13 and lost to No. 1 seed Washington in the first round of the NCAAs.

Consequently, they were picked to finish second behind rival Montana State in both the preseason coaches and media polls.

The one senior lost, though, was a big one - leading scorer and rebounder Kamarr Davis, one of the top go-to guys in the Big Sky the last two seasons. But because Davis missed a stretch of eight games in the middle of the season due to academic shortfalls, the current crop of Grizzlies already knows what it's like to play without him.

?We have to be better technically, in our execution, knowing that we probably don't have that guy you can throw the ball to and stay out of the way and expect something to happen,? Krystkowiak said. ?We've got players on our team, so that's not to say we can't make plays. I think we just have to be better with our setups and our screening, doing it by committee, rather than thinking somebody's got to pick up all that slack.?

This team is certainly not without firepower. The Griz return 61 percent of their scoring from last year, a total that would have been higher had not senior center John Seyfert blown out a knee prior to the start of practice. He'll miss the entire season.

The Griz return proven scorers in senior guards Kevin Criswell and Virgil Matthews, junior wing Matt Dlouhy, sophomore point guard Matt Martin, and sophomore post Andrew Strait. Martin and Strait each averaged better than 20 minutes a game as true freshmen.

Criswell currently ranks 11th on the school's all-time scoring list with 1,164 points. If he maintains the pace of his first three years, he'll finish his career fourth on that list, just ahead of assistant coach Wayne Tinkle (1,500 from 1985-89), but behind Bob Cope (1,808 from 1946-50), Micheal Ray Richardson (1,827 from 1974-78) and Krystkowiak (2,017 from 1982-86).

That returning nucleus will be bolstered by a talented freshman class that includes forwards Kyle Sharp and Austin Swift, center Eric Van Vliet, and guard Greg Spurgetis; plus junior college transfers Bryan Ellis, a cat-quick point guard, and wing Stuart Mayes. And 6-foot-9 Jordan Hasquet, a redshirt last season, could prove to be a difficult matchup for some of the league's post players.

The young big men, in particular, could be pressed into action due to the loss of Seyfert.

?With John in the lineup, we had a guy in the post who probably could defend almost any big guy in the league,? Krystkowiak said. ?When you lose a cog like that, you start thinking how are we going to defend the post? Are we going to front it, are we going to trap it? From a defensive point of view, it takes you down a different path.?

At just 6-8, Strait will take over Seyfert's center spot and Dlouhy will move from small to power forward once his sprained ankle heals. Criswell, Martin and Matthews will likely round out the starting five.

?If we're going to be a solid team, we better be good defensively,? Krystkowiak said. ?With this small lineup we're talking about, we can be pretty successful if we know we can defend ... and rebound. From an offensive point of view, I wouldn't want to play us.?

The Griz struggled on offense early last season, averaging 63.9 points in their first 10 games, but 72.0 the rest of the way.

?It took us well into league for some people to understand what we thought was a good shot,? Krystkowiak said. ?We're just really light years ahead of last year.?

Krystkowiak estimates he and assistants Tinkle, Brad Huse and Andy Hill have installed 90 percent of the Grizzlies' offense already. A bigger part of that picture this year will be the triangle offense popularized by NBA coach Phil Jackson and his one-time assistant Tex Winter. It's something Krystkowiak picked up while playing for Jackson.

?The thing that's good about it ... is that it gets your guys more skill development,? Krystkowiak said. ?It makes all four guys read and locate, then when they catch it they have to be able to hit one of the other four guys. It gives them a little bit of freedom, but also demands discipline.?

Just because the Griz are further along this season doesn't guarantee them another trip to the NCAAs. Krystkowiak declines to look beyond the Big Sky season.

?My scope only reaches March 8,? Krystkowiak said of the date of the league championship game. ?Your scope only has so much clarification to it, then things get a little fuzzy. I felt like we got better this morning and we'll try to get better this afternoon.

?If you're fortunate enough to represent your league again, you hope you're not a 16 seed, but that's off beyond the horizon.?

 

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Graham and the Broncos open with optimism

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Frustrating is a good word to describe last year's men's basketball season at Boise State.

The Broncos finished 16-18 because of inconsistent play brought on by a bevy of new players, injuries and chemistry problems.

Coach Greg Graham expects this season to be much different.

With a host of returning veterans and a handful of promising newcomers, the fourth-year coach is optimistic about the season, which opens tonight against Montana at Taco Bell Arena.

Tip-off is 7:35 p.m., and all tickets cost $2.

"We're definitely headed in the right direction. I really like our team,'' Graham said.

The Broncos won a pair of exhibition games against NAIA schools, and the thing that pleased Graham about those outings wasn't the outcome.

"I thought they played hard and tried to do what we asked them to do," he said. "We've shown some good things in exhibition games. We've shown some weaknesses, which is good because we've showed our guys what they can improve on."

The good: Ran the system, balanced scoring, rebounding.

The bad: Turnovers, lost focus with big leads.

There is always room for improvement in a program that hasn't reached the NCAA Tournament since 1994. The Broncos were picked to finish sixth in the WAC by conference coaches and media.

Will that forecast be correct? Here are a few things to watch that should impact the type of season the Broncos have.

Versatility is the key

Graham's team is full of interchangeable parts, something that will allow him to play many different combinations.

Against big teams such as Hawaii and Nevada, Graham can throw big bodies Tez Banks (6-9), Kurt Cunningham (6-9) and Colin Hallberg (6-11) into heavy rotation.

Against smaller and quicker teams, the Broncos can counter by using 6-6 forwards in the post and its bigger wings (Tyler Tiedeman and Coby Karl).

"We can throw different things at opponents," Graham said.

The most versatile player could Tiedeman. The 6-foot-7 transfer from Santa Rosa Junior College is a natural wing who also will play power forward this year. He's a sophomore who used to play college baseball at Arizona before an arm injury derailed a potential professional career.

Other Broncos who could play different spots are guards Eric Lane, Coby Karl and McNeal Thompson. All can run the point or play on the wing.

Keep an eye on injuries

The season hasn't started and the Broncos already have three players on the mend.

Thompson has a dislocated knee cap and is wearing a brace. He is expected to be able to play tonight.

So, too, is forward Seth Robinson. He sprained his ankle in the exhibition win against Albertson. The high-ankle sprain kept him out of the second exhibition game and has limited him at practice.

Senior Kareem Lloyd won't play tonight. He broke one of his big toes during practice and is expected to be out for another two or three weeks.

"Injuries have thrown us into a little bit of a tailspin as far as moving guys around," Graham said. "We won't be at 100 percent, but hopefully we can get close.

Shooting stars

The Broncos' style is to push the ball down the floor and to find open shots in transition or in a half-court offense. This year's roster is filled with players who can shoot the ball.

There are eight players with the ability to shoot 3-point shots. Point guard Eric Lane made seven 3-pointers last season, while Karl and Matt Bauscher also have long range.

Tiedeman, Robinson, Thompson, Lloyd and junior Kenny Wilson also can launch from beyond the arc.

Size matters

Undersized post players have been common at BSU in recent years, but the the Broncos are bucking that trend.

With Hallberg (6-11, 260) and Cunningham (6-9, 277), the Broncos have girth they've lacked in the past.

But Graham cautioned about depending too much on freshmen.

"They are going to have some ups and downs," Graham said. "So far they've done what they're supposed to do and have some confidence."

BSU also has size on the wings. With Tiedeman and Karl on the floor at the same time, opposing guards could have matchup problems against big guards who have the ability to shoot from the outside or take it to the basket.

Other questions

? How will the Broncos play on the road? BSU struggled away from home last season, winning only three road games. One of them was an upset win at Nevada in the quarterfinals of the WAC Tournament.

? Will the fans support this team? Last season, BSU averaged only 3,616 fans per home game when the school had sold more than 5,500 season tickets.

? How will the new WAC schedule impact BSU? With most teams playing one home and road game in the same week during conference play, home teams could lose their edge because they will be traveling back to play at home, possibly arriving after a visiting team coming into town for the game.

? Will the WAC get more than one team into the NCAA Tournament? The league has sent two teams the past two years, but the addition of RPI lightweights Idaho and New Mexico State might hurt the benefit of adding tournament regular Utah State.