MOSCOW, Idaho - Five University of Idaho men's basketball players scored in double digits and the Vandals shot 56.4 percent from the field to open the 2010-11 season with an 86-74 victory over Eastern Oregon on Saturday.
Senior guard Shawn Henderson and junior forward Djim Bandoumel led Idaho with 14 points each, while junior Luiz Toledo, senior Brandon Wiley and junior Jeremy Geiger also went for double figures in the team's regular-season debut.
"We've just got to keep taking it day by day and this team will keep getting better," Idaho head coach Don Verlin said. "I saw a lot of improvements in this basketball team this week."
The win puts Idaho at 1-0 for the season and improves the team to 3-0 in season openers under Verlin. The game counted as an exhibition for Eastern Oregon, so their record remains 4-0.
The Mountaineers stuck around on the strength of their 3-point shooting, as EOU hit 12 of its 24 attempts from downtown, five of which came from guard Thomas McCarthy, who scored 18 points and dished five assists in 38 minutes. Forward Jason Mumm led EOU with 21 points on 9-of-13 shooting.
"I told our guys this week - shooter's chance - if you can shoot, you've always got a chance to win," Verlin said of EOU's hot shooting. "I knew going into this game there were going to be some big swings like that, because they can get on a roll."
The Vandals led by as many as 11 points in the first half after two free throws by Bandoumel put Idaho up 20-9 at the 13:08 mark, but the Mountaineers took the lead late in the period on the heels of a 12-2 run over a span of four minutes, 30 seconds starting at 6:40. A Jeff Ledbetter 3-pointer with less than a minute to go put the Vandals back on top in the half, but they went into the break with just a 38-36 lead.
While EOU was the team that closed out the first half, it was the Vandals who set the tone in the second. Mumm tied the game at 38-38 on the first possession of the second half, but Idaho answered with a 17-2 run to take a 55-40 lead at the 15:15 mark.
"We were calm, but we were also fired up, because we knew we shouldn't have let them come back like that," Henderson said about the team's mentality during halftime. He came out and scored 11 of his 14 points and grabbed six of his seven rebounds after the break.
The lead remained in the double-digits for most of the second half, until a late EOU surge trimmed the lead to 75-70 with 2:15 remaining. Idaho closed the game out by going three-for-three from the field and making five of six free throws to extend its lead back out of harm's way.
"As I figure out more how I want to use the personnel we have, I think you'll continue to see this team get better," Verlin said. "They work extremely hard, they're good guys, and I think that's going to pay off for us by the end of this year."
While the team will enjoy its season-opening victory, Idaho's attention now focuses to a tougher foe in border rival Washington State, which also opened its season Saturday night with an 86-47 home victory over Southern.
Tip-off for Tuesday's game is 7 p.m. (PT) at WSU's Friel Court.
