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Senior guard Anthony Johnson scored a game-high 22 points to lead The University of Montana Grizzlies to an 81-60 victory over the Northern Arizona Lumberjacks in the America First Credit Union Big Sky Conference Men’s Basketball Tournament quarterfinal game Saturday evening in UM’s Dahlberg Arena.
In the other quarterfinal game, third-seed Montana State (15-14) was upset 68-65 by sixth-seeded Portland State (13-18) this evening in Bozeman.
With the win, the fourth-seeded Grizzlies racked up their 20th victory of the season, improving to 20-9 overall. Fifth-seed NAU ends its season at 14-14. This is Montana’s first 20-win season since 2005-06 (24-7) and just the second time in the past 13 years it has reached the 20-victory plateau.
Montana will play the second-seeded Northern Colorado Bears (24-6) in a conference tournament semifinal game at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, March 9, in a game which will be aired on Altitude TV. Number one seed and tournament host Weber State (19-9) plays sixth-seed PSU in the second semifinal game on Tuesday, with tip-off at 7:00 p.m. Both games will be played in WSU’s Dee Events Center (12,000).
The Grizzlies, who are now 12-0 this season when scoring 70 or more points, jumped to an early 7-0 led on a three-pointer by Johnson and back-to-back buckets by freshman guard Will Cherry, and led the contest from wire-to-wire.
Montana led by as many as 17 points in the first half, and were led by sophomore forward Derek Selvig’s 9 points, while Johnson and Cherry scored 8 apiece en route to a 39-25 Griz lead at intermission.
The second half was more of the same, as Montana maintained a double-digit lead and led by at least 13 points the rest of the way. The closest NAU could get was 44-31 with 15:36 left on a jumper by junior guard Cameron Jones.
After Jones’ jumper had cut the UM advantage to 13 at 44-31, the Griz scored three unanswered buckets and grabbed a 52-31 lead on a tip-in by junior forward Raason Young with 11:50 remaining.
Johnson, who was 8-of-12 from the field, made all three of his three-point attempts, and was 3-of-4 from the line, scored 14 of his game-high 22 points in the second half.
Johnson, a unanimous first team All-Big Sky pick for the second season in a row this season, has now scored 20 or more points 28 times in his career. His 548 points this year rank him sixth in single-season scoring in school history, while his 1,057 career points move him up to 20th in the UM record books. Johnson is the first two-year Griz player ever at Montana to score 1,000 or more points.
Cherry scored 11 points and hauled down a career and game-high 9 rebounds to go along with his 6 assists and 4 steals. Young was 5-of-8 from the field and scored all 11 of his points in the second half.
Selvig scored all 9 of his points in the first half. Junior center Brian Qvale added 8 points, 8 rebounds, and a pair of blocks, while senior guard Ryan Staudacher also tallied 8 points.
Montana was 32-of-65 (49.2%) from the field, made 9-of-17 (52.9%) three-pointers, and was 8-of-14 (57.1%) from the line. NAU made 26-of-56 (46.4%) shots, 3-of-13 (23.1%) treys, and 5-of-9 (55.6%) charity shots.
The Griz had a substantial rebounding advantage, 41-29, including 15 offensive boards.
NAU was led by Jones, who was also a unanimous all-league selection, with 21 points. Senior forward Nick Larson added 11 points and a team-high 7 rebounds, while junior forward Shane Johannsen did not score, but blocked 5 shots.