Montana State Survives Sacramento State Comeback Bid Late in 68-66 Win

Saturday, December 4

Sacramento, CA

2 p.m.

Montana State University

5-4,1-1Big Sky

Sacramento State

3-5,0-2Big Sky

Montana St.

Sacramento St.

Amin Adamu

Montana State Survives Sacramento State Comeback Bid Late in 68-66 Win

12/4/2021 6:03:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Box Score

The Bobcats built a 20-point lead in the second half and nearly watched it vanish, but endured a Sacramento State go-ahead 3-point attempt at the buzzer that fell short to escape The Nest with a 68-66 victory

By: Andrew Pedersen

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Montana State built a 20-point lead in the second half and nearly watched it vanish, but endured a Sacramento State go-ahead 3-point attempt at the buzzer that fell short to escape The Nest with a 68-66 victory over the Hornets in Big Sky Conference men's basketball Saturday.

The Bobcats led for a majority of the first half. MSU saw a seven-point lead get erased into a 23-all tie with 4 minutes, 10 seconds left. The Bobcats found their footing to end the half though. The 'Cats went on a 10-point run to get the lead into double digits and an Abdul Mohamed 3-pointer closed out the opening half with MSU ahead 41-27.

Mohamed scored 14 of the Bobcats' first-half points.

"Abdul was terrific in the first half," Sprinkle said. "He hit some 3s and had a couple good rebounds. He put everyone at ease. With him scoring it, it really eased the load on everybody."

The Bobcats used a 10-0 run – after the Hornets made the opening field goal of the second half – in a less than two-minute span to increase the lead to 51-32. An Amin Adamu jumper with 12:28 remaining gave MSU a 57-37 edge over Sacramento State.

The Hornets continued to battle over the remainder of the contest. Sacramento State got the scoring margin into single digits with 3:19 to play and a 16-2 scoring run cut the deficit to 63-60 with 1:25 left.

Montana State went without a field goal over the last 5:49 of the contest. The Bobcats led 67-64 with 20 seconds on the clock and had four free throw attempts down the stretch. MSU was only able to connect on one as Sacramento State had a final possession with the ball trailing 68-66 with four seconds remaining.

"We took some quick, bad shots," Sprinkle said. "We were up 20 and thought we could do our own thing. You can't do that in conference play, you have to keep executing. We had some bad, careless turnovers. Uncharacteristic missed free throws, that's stuff to clean up."

Bryce Fowler, who scored 21 of the Hornets' 39 points on 8 of 15 shooting in the second half, put up a 3-point attempt as the buzzer sounded. His shot from outside the arc on the wing narrowly fell off the front rim as Sacramento State nearly completed the comeback.

"That was way too entertaining for me," Sprinkle said. "I lost about half my hair and the rest of it went gray over the last 10 minutes.

"He's such a terrific player," Sprinkle said of Fowler. "He carried them that entire second half. We didn't stop him, he scored whenever he wanted. That 3 from my vantage point was as straight as an arrow. The basketball gods were with us tonight, we did just enough to get it done."

Montana State improved to 5-4 overall and picked up its first victory of the season in Big Sky Conference play. Sacramento State dropped to 3-5 overall and 0-2 in league action.

The Bobcats were led in the scoring column by Jubrile Belo (18), Mohamed (16), Adamu (10) and Xavier Bishop (10). Mohamed had a team-high 11 rebounds while he and Bishop each had four assists.

MSU outshot Sacramento State 50-43% but turned the ball over five more times than the Hornets.

Fowler scored a career-high 32 points to pace Sacramento State. Deshaun Highler joined him in double figures with 11 points while Highler also had a game-high four steals.

Montana State returns to Bozeman to host its first Division I opponent of the 2021-22 season on Tuesday, Dec. 7. The Bobcats will take on North Dakota State with tipoff set for 7 p.m. at Worthington Arena. The game will be streamed on ESPN+ while fans can also tune into the Bobcat Radio Network locally or on msubobcats.com/watch and on the Varsity Network app.