The No. 1 College of Idaho men's basketball team extended a pair of winning streak five-straight Cascade Collegiate Conference quarterfinal wins and 28 regular seasons - as they defeated a pesky Bushnell squad, 87-70 in the opening round of the CCC Tournament on Tuesday night.
College of Idaho (28-1), who holds the nation's longest winning streak, was paced by a 17-point effort from sophomore
Tyler Robinett. He was joined in double figures by a pair of 14-point scorers -
Charles Elzie and
Johnny Radford and a 13-point effort from
Jake O'Neil.
Bushnell (12-17) had three players in double figures, including a double double from Spencer Hoffman, who had 20 points and 13 rebounds. He was joined in dobule figures by Stevie Schlabach and Luke Smith, who had 13 and 10 points, respectively.
The two teams traded 3-pointers to start the game before five unanswered by Robinett that included a 3-pointer and a layup that put the host Yotes, who extended their home winning streak to 30 in the win, ahead for the remainder of the contest. Twice, the Beacons managed to cut the deficit to one in the first 10 minutes of the contest. With College of Idaho holding on to a 20-19 lead with 10:06 left in the first half, the Yotes scored nine straight for a 10-point lead, 29-19 with 7:29 left in the first half. Bushnell did not flinch and managed to get the deficit down to two, later in the half before a second 9-0 spurt by College of Idaho ended the half that was punctuated by a banked-in,.half court 3-pointer by Elzie.
In the second half, Elzie made a layup that put the lead at double digits for the remainder of the contest as College of Idaho punched its ticket into Friday's semifinals.Â
Next, the Yotes will now face No. 5 seed Corban, who defeated No. 4 seed Warner Pacific, 73-63,  on Friday in the CCC semifinals taking place Friday night at 7:30 p.m. inside the J.A. Albertson Activities Center in Caldwell. Fans are encouraged to wear WHITE.
