LC State men advance behind Lustig’s milestone day

Facing a team a third time is “not a lot of fun,” Lewis-Clark State men’s basketball coach Austin Johnson said. So imagine facing a team for the second time in five days.

It didn’t faze the Warriors.

MaCarhy Morris posted 23 points, Colfax alumn John Lustig added 18 to surpass 1,000 career points and third-seeded LC State beat sixth-seeded Corban 88-75 in the Cascade Conference Tournament quarterfinals on Tuesday at the P1FCU Activity Center in Lewiston.

The LC State Warriors (23-6) trailed for just 15 seconds early in the game and the sharpshooting Corban (Ore.) Warriors (15-14) stayed on their heels, drawing within two scores of LC State late and taking advantage of 15 turnovers before a clutch 3-pointer and a stunning 64.9% shooting mark helped the Warriors of Lewiston win the battle.

With the win, LC State will host No. 7 Multnomah in the CCC semifinals at 7 p.m. Friday in Lewiston.

“We got back at 3:30 a.m. on Sunday, and we’re a tired team, and we kind of had some tired moments, but a lot of really good things from our guys,” Johnson said. “We’re just sticking with it.”

A lot of shooters

With just over two-and-a-half minutes left in the game, the visiting Warriors had drawn within six points of LC State.

Then, true freshman Dylan Skaife stepped to the top of the key and let loose a blistering 3-pointer which pushed the LC State lead to nine with 154 seconds left.

“Huge 3,” Johnson said of Skaife’s second-half shot. “We want him to be shot-ready. We want him to be confident. And so I was really pleased with him being ready for that moment.”

Morris said that Skaife has impressed as a true freshman who was hardly ever playing at the start of the year but became a starter down the stretch.

Skaife sank two 3-pointers and dished out three assists, including a long chuck over Corban’s heads and into the hands of a waiting Alton Hamilton, who slam-dunked the ball through the nylon and took his time to hang from the rim as the home crowd got about the loudest it got all night.

Morris paced LC State in scoring on an 8-for-11 shooting mark. He made two 3-pointers, both enabled by cross-court passes from Hamilton who put Morris in a perfect place to score.

LCSC senior Gorden Boykins also thrived on the floor, posting 13 points. Boykins made a 3-pointer and corralled three offensive rebounds which he transferred into putbacks to extend LC State’s lead.

Containing No. 13

Corban guard No. 13 Luc Krystkowiak, the son of former NBA player Larry Krystkowiak, dominated the game with a 10-for-14 mark for a game-high 25 points.

“He’s a guy who can score in the post, he can score off the drive and then he was hitting 3s tonight at a clip he normally hadn’t,” Johnson said of Krystkowiak. “That’s a tough cover for Alton, you know, guarding on the perimeter.”

Despite Krystkowiak’s dominance, no other Corban Warrior scored more than 12 points as LC State played enough defense in the first half to survive a second-half surge.

“If we can just limit them to one guy scoring, one guy can’t beat all five of us,” Morris said.

Lustig’s milestone

The Warriors’ senior guard posted his 18 points on the night to total 1,001 career points.

Despite committing five turnovers, some of which Corban turned to points, Lustig found a way to wipe it from his memory and do, as his coach often says, “the next right thing.”

Lustig made 8-of-15 shots to total 18 points, the final shot of which saw him trace the baseline, switch hands while leaping toward the rim and make the layup to total exactly 1,000 career points. He made a free throw about a minute later to surpass the 1,000-point mark.

“It means a lot,” Lustig said of the milestone. “Just the faith that the program has in me and coach Johnson has (in me) and just staying with this program and trying to win games. But more excited about the win today and that we just have an opportunity to move on.”

(At least) one more men’s hoops home game

Soon after beating their visiting Warrior adversaries, a small contingent of players, fans and staff huddled around their phones and laptops about 20 minutes after LC State had punched its ticket to the semifinals.

The Warriors eagerly watched as the seventh-seeded Multnomah Lions closed out an 84-75 upset win over second-seeded Oregon Tech.

The win meant that LC State will host Multnomah at 7 p.m. Friday at the P1FCU Activity Center.

The Warriors have been winning all year and don’t plan to change anything in the postseason.

“It’s playoff games,” Hamilton said. “But nothing really changes for us.”

LEWIS-CLARK STATE (23-6)

Hamilton 8-9 0-0 16, Morris 8-11 5-5 23, Lustig 8-15 2-2 18, King 1-2 0-0 3, Skaife 2-5 0-0 6, Boykins 6-9 0-0 13, Smith 4-6 0-0 9, Salguero 0-0 0-0 0, Carpenter 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 37-57 7-7 88.

CORBAN (15-14)

L. Krystkowiak 10-14 3-4 25, Veliz 0-3 0-0 0, B. Krystkowiak 3-3 0-0 8, Hinton 1-5 0-0 2, Sherburne 2-2 0-0 5, Word 6-14 0-0 12, Milosevic 1-2 1-2 3, Caoile 5-8 1-2 12, Franklin 1-1 0-0 2, Verma 0-1 0-0 0, Knox 2-2 0-0 6, Classen 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 31-55 4-6 75.

Halftime — LCSC 41, COR 29; 3-point goals — COR 9-15 (Word 0-1, Hinton 0-1, Veliz 0-2, L. Krystkowiak 3-4, B. Krystkowiak 2-2, Caolie 1-2, Sherburne 1-1, Knox 2-2); LCSC 7-14 (Morris 2-5, King 1-1, Skaife 2-5, Smith 1-1, Boykins 1-2). Assists — COR 9 (Caolie 4), LCSC 17 (Lustig 5). Rebounds — COR 17 (Caolie 3), LCSC 27 (Hamilton 12). Technical fouls — None. Total fouls — COR 12, LCSC 5. Attendance — 867.

Taylor can be reached at 208-848-2268, staylor@lmtribune.com or on X (formerly Twitter) @Sam_C_Taylor.