Trenton McLaughlin scores 25 points to lead Northern Arizona over Idaho

Jan. 25—MOSCOW, Idaho — Idaho's game against Northern Arizona featured a Star Wars promotion, and the Force was strong with someone in the ICCU Arena Thursday.

Unfortunately, it wasn't a Vandal.

NAU's Trenton McLaughlin scored a game-high 25 points on 9-of-13 shooting from the floor, including hitting 4 of 6 3-pointers, and he made all three of his free throws as the Lumberjacks turned the corner on a 38-36 halftime lead and powered their way to a 75-60 victory.

"That was my matchup. It was not good enough," Idaho's Trevon Blassingame said.

"We allowed McLaughlin to get comfortable early," added Tyler Linhardt. "Until we figure that out, it's going to hurt us." Linhardt scored nine points and led the Vandals with five rebounds.

With the win, NAU evened its record at 10-10, 3-3 in the Big Sky Conference. Idaho is 7-12 and 1-5.

From the opening tip, Idaho fashioned one of its most dominant efforts on both ends of the court. The Vandals spread the floor and fed Julius Mims at the rim early and often. He was the Vandals' leading scorer at halftime with 10 points and finished with a team-high 15 points, three steals and five blocks.

Terren Frank was Idaho's only double-figures scorer with 10 points.

Idaho also successfully countered the Lumberjacks' effort to get a perimeter game going.

Since the Lumberjacks' shooters were cold everywhere else, NAU ran its offense through 6-foot-10 Carson Basham. This primarily consisted of Basham setting screens and diving toward the low block. Basham finished the first half with 13 points

It looked like Idaho might have caught a game-changing break when Basham left the game at the first time out with one foul. He came back about four minutes later but went right back out to the bench with a second foul. Idaho was leading 21-11 and maintained a 10-point advantage until the score reached 25-15.

Unfortunately for the Vandals, however, in Basham's absence, McLaughlin caught fire. The Vandals saw their lead melt away in the closing six minutes of the first half as the Lumberjacks outscored them 15-4. McLaughlin finished the half with 16 points. He knocked down a 3-pointer and a free throw with 2:56 to play to give NAU its first lead, 30-29.

Idaho steadied itself, though, and regained a short-lived, one-point edge before exiting the first half down by two after McLaughlin hit from beyond the arc again with 2 seconds remaining.

"We did a really good job in the first half until McLaughlin got going," Idaho coach Alex Pribble said.

In the second half, Idaho's field-goal shooting, which had been an impressive 15 of 31 in the opening half, fell off to 8 of 25 as Idaho's smoothly flowing offense congealed.

"They start making shots, and we're in a little bit of a panic mode," Pribble said. "We have got to stick with the process."

As the Vandals poured effort into their defense, "we squeeze a little too tight on the offensive end," Pribble said.

He, Blassingame and Linhardt echoed similar themes on the state of the Vandals midway through their season.

"We need to find a way to finish games," Linhardt said. "Until we put a full 40 minutes together, we are not going to beat anybody in this conference."

"In the second half, when we face adversity, we start forcing it," Blassingame said.

These are attributes of a young team still finding its way, according to Pribble.

"This is the tough part of the journey," he said. "We are a young team learning some hard lessons the first time through the Big Sky Conference."

He insists current travails which have seen Idaho drop six straight since collecting its lone Big Sky win with a buzzer beater against Sacramento State will eventually mold a tough, competitive second-half team.

But impatience is coloring the process.

"We've got to learn these lessons sooner than later," Pribble said.