• MEN’S BASKETBALL

TWIN FALLS — Coaches and players for the fifth-ranked North Idaho College men’s basketball team have been preaching it all season.

When one guy has a off night, another has his back.

On Saturday night, it was NIC sophomore Kyle Guice that started it in the second half, and BJ Blake that finished it, helping the Cardinals beat the Southern Idaho Golden Eagles 84-71 in a Scenic West Athletic Conference game on Saturday night.

After a sluggish start to the game on Saturday from beyond the 3-point line, Guice hit three straight 3-pointers in a 19-5 run to start the second half as NIC stretched the advantage to 58-43.

“We just had a tough time shooting it in the first half and were 2 for 11 from beyond the 3-point line,” NIC coach Corey Symons said. “Kyle hit those shots and really got us going. We kind of got our rhythm and energy going again. It was a great game, in a hostile environment and just good to get a league win.”

NIC improves to 21-0, 6-0 and will host Colorado Northwestern on Thursday night at 7:30.

Shaq Carr scored 13 points for CSI (15-6, 3-3).

In other conference games, Salt Lake blitzed Colorado Northwestern 87-39 in Rangely, Colo., and Snow beat Utah State-Eastern 76-59 in Price, Utah.

NORTH IDAHO

BJ Blake 8-16 5-7 24, Kyle Guice 4-7 0-0 11, Lucas Antunez 2-4 6-6 10, Braian Angola-Rodas 2-8 3-3 8, Kaleb Warner 3-4 0-0 8, Trey Burch-Manning 2-5 7-11 11, Haywood Irwin 3-4 0-0 6, Sam Dowd 2-5 0-0 4, Zaequan Satterhwaite 1-3 0-0 2. Totals 27-56 21-27 84.

SOUTHERN IDAHO

Shaq Carr 4-10 4-4 13, Glorie Biongo 5-9 1-2 12, Pape Diatta 3-6 4-7 4, Marquis Godfrey 2-4 2-4 6, EJ Boyce 0-4 0-0 0, UC Iroegbu 4-6 0-0 12, Ar’Mond Davis 3-16 0-0 9, Dakota Chambers 2-2 0-2 2, Con Bauer 1-6 0-0 2, Austin Winegar 1-1 0-0 2. Totals 25-64 11-19 71.

Halftime — NIC 38-30. 3-point goals — NIC 9-25 (Blake 3-7, Guice 3-6, Antunez 0-1, Angola-Rodas 1-5, Warner 2-3, Irwin 0-1, Dowd 0-2), CSI 10-29 (Carr 1-2, Biongo 1-3, Diatta 0-1, Boyce 0-3, Iroegbu 4-6, Davis 3-9, Bauer 1-5). Rebounds — NIC 43 (Burch-Manning 10), CSI 31 (Diatta 8). Assists — NIC 19 (Angola-Rodas 6), CSI 15 (Carr 6). Team fouls — NIC 18, CSI 21. Fouled out — none.

• WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Southern Idaho 72

North Idaho 70

TWIN FALLS — Shelby Cloninger scored 15 points and Stormee Van Belle added 14 for the 25th-ranked Cardinals, which lost in heartbreaking fashion to the seventh-ranked Golden Eagles for the second time in as many conference games this season.

CSI sophomore Kandiss Barber hit a jumper with one second remaining that proved to be the difference.

“It was a great game,” NIC coach Chris Carlson said. “An absolute great game. Our gameplan was to come out aggressive and play great defense, and we gave up 25 points in the first quarter, so that didn’t work. We held them to eight (points) in the second quarter and scored 16 to get back into it.”

NIC (15-4, 3-3 SWAC) couldn’t convert in the final moments.

“We did a lot of good things,” said Carlson, who had eight players miss practice last week due to illness. “We’re almost completely healthy. If we can continue to do those things we do well for an entire game, we’ll be in business. In the second half, we really created some mismatches and gave ourselves a chance to win.”

CSI (20-1, 5-1) beat NIC in double overtime 87-83 on Dec. 12 in Coeur d’Alene.

“To have two games come down to buzzer beaters against CSI, it just shows we need to make those plays,” Carlson said.

In other SWAC play, Salt Lake beat Colorado Northwestern 84-54 in Rangely, Colo., and Snow beat Utah State-Eastern 59-48 in Price, Utah.

NORTH IDAHO

Shelby Cloninger 6-11 2-2 15, Stormee Van Belle 5-12 1-2 14, Maci Benedict 3-10 2-2 11, Ebony Norman 4-8 0-0 8, Monica Landdeck 2-8 1-2 5, Grace Varcoe 3-5 4-4 10, Jocelyn Cook-Cox 1-4 2-2 4, Alyssa Case 1-5 1-2 3, Gracie Roberts 0-2 0-0 0, Charity Marlatt 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 25-65 13-16 70.

SOUTHERN IDAHO

Kandiss Barber 11-24 1-2 23, Samantha Luebke 4-5 5-6 13, Brianna Osorio 4-8 2-2 10, Matti Ventling 4-8 0-1 10, Anna Jofresa 1-4 0-0 2, Ma Kenzie Van Sickle 3-12 0-0 9, Tori Anderson 1-2 2-2 5, Alexia Mefi 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 28-65 10-13 72.

North Idaho 15 16 13 26 — 70

Southern Idaho 25 8 22 17 — 72

3-point goals — NIC 7-27 (Cloninger 1-4, Van Belle 3-5, Benedict 3-7, Norman 0-2, Landdeck 0-2, Varcoe 0-1, Cook-Cox 0-1, Case 0-3, Roberts 0-1), CSI 6-21 (Osorio 0-2, Ventling 2-6, Jofresa 0-1, Van Sickle 3-10, Anderson 1-2). Rebounds — NIC 40 (Varcoe 8), CSI 41 (Barber 11). Assists — NIC 19 (Cloninger, Roberts 4), CSI 17 (Osorio 7). Team fouls — NIC 17, CSI 14. Fouled out — Van Belle. Technical fouls — Cloninger.

• WRESTLING

Great Falls 26

North Idaho 20

MISSOULA, Mont. — Injury and other concerns kept the Cardinals from beating the NAIA Argos at Sentinel High.

“We had to forfeit two matches due to injuries,” NIC coach Pat Whitcomb said. “Tim Parten wrestled for us at 197 pounds, he usually wrestles for us at 184 pounds. Jordan Lacelle (at 184) suffered a torn ACL at the beginning of the season.”

Jordan Cooks was dismissed for violation of team rules on Tuesday.

“We won’t have him at 157, so that weight is open,” Whitcomb said. “That’s an unfortunate situation but we wish him the best but we’ll move on and we’ll put guys into the weights that we have. The guys who did wrestle did well. Alex Aguilar, who was wrestling 157 but we moved him up to 170, he looked real good. That’s where he’ll be the rest of the year. We were down 12 points against a good NAIA school. But we’ll take the good things we did and go from there.”

NIC wrestles at Highline on Thursday.

125 — Luke Schlosser, GF, tf. Trey Long, 20-3. 133 — Jared Berlinger, GF, d. Isaac Aguilar, 6-3. 141 — Deondre Wilson, NIC, tf. Justin Whitman, 18-3. 149 — Jared Sumauang, NIC, d. Travis Vermulm, 8-3. 157 — Isiah Yates, GF, by forfeit. 165 — Dajour Reece, NIC, d. Joe Else, 12-6. 174 — Alex Aguilar, NIC, p. Jacob Wharton, 4:04. 184 — Taylor Vaughn, GF, by forfeit. 197 — Sam Voigtlaender, GF, p. Tim Parten, 2:48. 285 — Damian Trujillo, NIC, d. Justin Harbison, 4-3.