MOSCOW - What's a game without a little adversity?

This time, the Idaho Vandals' response was exactly what coach Robb Akey wanted to see - a fiery, fierce answer to North Dakota's slapping them a couple times early and ultimately a 44-14 non-conference victory that leveled Idaho's record at 1-1.

"I'm glad to have a finish like we expected to have," Akey said. "We came out and performed better in the second half - more like we expected to; more like our players expected to."

North Dakota (1-1), which lost 45-0 a year ago to the Vandals, responded to Idaho's second-quarter field goal with a 79-yard punt return for a TD, then a 54-yard pass play between quarterback Joey Bradley and receiver Greg Hardin. With 7:33 left in the first half, the upstart Fighting Sioux were leading 14-3 and the Vandals were misfiring on offense.

Then Idaho quarterback Brian Reader found his groove and completed 11 consecutive passes — using different six receivers in a 15-play drive, to score on an 8-yard toss to Armauni Johnson to close the gap to 14-10 with 1:01 left in the half.

Reader’s precision didn’t stop there. As the second half unfolded, Reader extended his streak of completions to 15 as he engineered back-to-back scoring drives to push the Vandals to a 24-14 lead and, more importantly, give them the powerful punch of momentum.

“We were given the opportunity to deal with adversity today,” Akey said. “They guys got some things taken care of. We started to make some plays.”

In the meantime, not to be outdone, the defense was stopping plays. After giving up the 54-yard scoring play with almost half the second quarter still to play, it held the Fighting Sioux to just 94 total yards for the rest of the game and added some icing to its cake with two interceptions — one of which was returned for a touchdown by true freshman Bradley Njoku. Senior Korey Toomer had the other.

“When you face adversity,” said senior linebacker and team captain Tre`Shawn Robinson, who led the defense with eight tackles, “make sure you respond to it. You can’t just sit there.”

That they didn’t. Said junior receiver Mike Scott, who matched Johnson’s team-leading eight catches, “We just came out like a train with no brakes.”

Johnson led the receivers with 99 yards on his eight catches, while Scott covered 97 on his eight. Again, Reader found receptive receivers throughout the ranks with eight players catching at least one pass. Among those was sophomore tight end Mike LaGrone, who scored for the second game in a row, and junior Marsel Posey, who caught his first career TD with a 14-yarder to open the third quarter. Junior running back Ryan Bass scored his first TD for the Vandals and Scott and Johnson scored once as well.

The Vandals totaled 424 yards of offense to 197 for North Dakota. Reader wound up 27 of 39 for 299 yards and the running-back-by-committee netted 117 total yards with Bass’ 57 the most.

Mitch Sutton, who was last week’s Great West offensive player of the week after rushing for 105 yards in North Dakota’s 16-0 win over Drake, was held to 22 yards on nine carries.