SEATTLE — If Jon Brockman and Ryan Appleby are going to be responsible for carrying the offensive load for the Huskies this season, they showed they are willing to shoulder that burden.
The duo from Snohomish County came up big Tuesday night, combining for 45 points in Washington’s 84-65 victory over Portland State.
After a sub-par outing against Portland Saturday, Brockman was back to his old self Tuesday with 24 points and 12 rebounds. Appleby, meanwhile, continued his hot shooting in his third game of the season by tying a school record with seven 3-pointers to finish with 21 points. Appleby, who was 7-for-11 on threes and had four assists, is now 17-for-31 on 3-point attempts since coming back from a fractured thumb that kept him out of Washington’s first seven games.
“Brockman is an All-American and Appleby played like an All-American, so it’s tough to compete with that,” said Portland State coach Ken Bone, a former UW assistant who helped recruit Brockman out of Snohomish High School.
“I think they complement each other,” Lorenzo Romar said of Brockman and Appleby. “Jon would probably tell you right away that he didn’t play his best basketball the last game or couple of games. Ryan has come in new and has shot the ball well all three games, and Jon joined him tonight.” The Vikings were competitive in the first half thanks to some hot shooting of their own. While Appleby made five of six 3-point attempts in the half, he wasn’t even the best shooter in Hec Edmundson Pavilion. That distinction went to Portland State’s Mickey Polis, who made all five of his attempts, including one on which he was fouled, setting up a four-point play.
Portland State shot 58.4 percent in the first half, and made 66.7 percent of its three-point attempts, but still trailed by six at the intermission thanks to a strong finish by Appleby. The senior guard first drained a three with 30 seconds remaining, then after a rare Portland State miss with six seconds to go, Appleby had just enough time to dribble down the floor and pull up for a 25-foot buzzer-beater.
“That kind of thing gets the crowd pumped up and gets the team pumped up,” Brockman said. “Anytime you can go into a half with six extra points, it’s a big, big deal.”
Initially, the Vikings picked up where they left off, making their first three 3-point attempts of the second half. Eventually, however, some minor defensive adjustments by the Huskies helped slow the 6-point barrage as the Vikings missed their past seven attempts.
“The big difference in the second half was that we switched defenders,” Romar said, referring to his team’s defense on Polis and Jeremiah Dominguez, who combined to make seven of eight 3-point attempts in the first half. “We tried to keep a bigger defender on them. In the first half we had smaller guys on those guys and they were getting loose. … In the second half we did a better job of not losing those guys and keeping guys in front of us so we weren’t in rotation situations.”
Washington, meanwhile, kept shooting well and finished the game making 61.8 percent of its field goal attempts. That’s the highest total for the Huskies since they shot 67 percent against Arizona State on Feb. 6 1999.
Despite finishing cold, the Vikings still shot 52 percent for the game, but a good night shooting couldn’t make up for a huge rebounding mismatch. Washington out-rebounded the Vikings 34-14, and Portland State’s total was the lowest for a UW opponent in at least a quarter century.
For the second straight game, Romar went with a starting lineup of Brockman, Appleby, Artem Wallace, Joel Smith and Tim Morris. And for the second straight game, Justin Holliday and Joe Wolfinger were the odd men out when it came to playing time. Romar has tinkered with his lineup and rotation throughout non-conference play while putting an emphasis on defense.
“I feel like we’re making progress,” Romar said. “With this lineup, there are some guys that aren’t in the lineup, that, if they were able to catch these guys defensively, they’d be in the lineup, because they’re better offensive players. But at this point, these guys give us the best defensive presentation, so we’re going to continue to go with them.”
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