Yellowjackets Sting Chaminade, Take Sole Possession of Second Place in PacWest (Jan. 24, 2004)
Skrifvars Reaches 1,000 Career Points
Box Score

BILLINGS, MT – The MSU Billings men’s basketball team took one small step and reached two major milestones Saturday night.  The Yellowjackets dispatched a scrappy Chaminade team, 107-84, taking one step closer to capturing the PacWest Conference championship, while senior captain Jerett Skrifvars became the nineteenth player in Yellowjackets history to score 1,000 points in a career, netting 24 to reach 1,013 for his career.

In addition to Skrifvars’s climb into the record books, the Yellowjackets won their 21^st straight home game dating back to January 14 of last season.  The win streak is currently the fourth longest in the nation, behind District of Columbia, Florida Gulf Coast, and Cal State-San Bernardino.  It is also the fourth-longest home winning streak in school history.

“There have been some good players who have played here,” said Skrifvars.  “I just come out to play my best every night.  Every year we just try to work to get into the tournament.  If I have to score points to help us do that, then that’s what I’ll do.”

MSU Billings started the game making seven of their first nine shots, including four 3-pointers to jump to an 18-8 lead.  After five straight Yellowjacket misses allowed the Silverswords to draw within five at 21-16, seven straight points from Skrifvars opened a 28-16 Jackets’ advantage.  He scored his 1,000^th point on a fast break lay-up at the 9:22 mark of the half, giving the Jackets their second double-digit lead of the night. 

The Yellowjackets pushed their lead to 61-39 by halftime, shooting over 60 percent from the field and making 11 of 19 from 3-point range.  It was the second time in the last three games that MSUB went into halftime with a 20-point lead.

“It did feel like we were making shots,” said Skrifvars of the Jackets’ hot start.  “But when I looked up at halftime, I couldn’t believe there were 61 points on the board.  Our offense is starting to come around.  It feels like it’s starting to come together.  We’re done feeling each other out and we’re comfortable with each other.  We have over half a season under our belts now, and that experience is helping.”

MSU Billings is averaging a PacWest best 95.4 points per game while also leading the conference with 12.8 three-pointers a game.  Hawaii-Hilo wasn’t able to handle the Jackets’ long range shooting in a pair of losses earlier in the week, and the Silverswords weren’t able to match up to the Yellowjacket shooters on Saturday. 

Trae Fortier and Cameron Munoz each hit five 3-pointers in the game and the Jackets finished with 14 as a team.  Fortier matched his career high with 37 points, and his five 3-pointers were also a career-best.  The junior forward leads the PacWest with a 23.1 ppg scoring average.  Munoz finished the night with 22 points, 17 of which came in the first half as he was good on 4 of 5 from behind the arc.  He leads the conference and the nation for 3-point shooting, averaging 4.6 threes a game.

Despite the 22-point halftime deficit, the Silverswords made a run of their own to start the second half.  They made 11 of their first 17 field goal attempts of the second half, cutting the Yellowjackets’ to as little as nine.  Kashif Reyes sparked the rally, connecting on his first four 3-pointers of the half.  He scored 13 of his team-high 18 points during a four minutes stretch that saw the Jackets’ double-digit lead disappear.  A put back by Scott Metcalf with 10:09 to play cut MSUB’s lead to 78-69.

Fortier took over from that point, scoring 11 of the Yellowjackets next 17 points.  His fast break dunk with 4:36 remaining iced the game, giving MSU Billings a 97-75 lead.  Fortier was 14 of 22 from the field in the game and also grabbed five rebounds and handed out five assists.  Dave Carse added two 3-pointers for six points and dished out a game-high seven assists.

“We know that we have to play them (Chaminade) two times on the road,” said Skrifvars, “so we wanted to show what we were about.  It was our fifth game in about a week, so I think we came out a little tired in the second half.  Coach let us know that we needed to pick it up (in the last ten minutes).”

The Yellowjackets’ road to the NCAA Tournament is now a ten-step process that begins next Thursday when the Jackets play the first of two games at Western New Mexico.  MSU Billings has ten games remaining against PacWest teams, with half of them at home.  The Mustangs upset Hawaii-Hilo, 77-70, Saturday night dropping the preseason favorite Vulcans further in the PacWest standings.

While winning their remaining conference games would guarantee the Yellowjackets the PacWest title and automatic NCAA Tournament berth, as few as seven victories could accomplish the same result.  MSU Billings is currently chasing frontrunner BYU-Hawaii (5-0 in the PacWest) for the conference crown.  The Yellowjackets will host the Seasiders twice in Billings on February 10 and 12.

With the three conference wins this week, the Yellowjackets have positioned themselves to climb in the NCAA West Region poll.  They debuted at No. 10 in the year’s first top ten poll this week.  This week’s two victories over Hawaii-Hilo, ranked No. 6 in the region, and Saturday’s win against Chaminade give MSUB a 7-4 West Region record.