LEWISTON, Idaho – About the only things that were missing were the hard hats, work boots, and lunch pails at the Lewis-Clark State College's Activity Center on Wednesday night.

The Warrior men's basketball team took care of the rest and used a workman-like effort to defeat Great Falls 83-66 in the opening round of the Frontier Conference Tournament.

The win improves to the Warriors, the No. 3 seed in the tournament, to 22-9, and moves LC into the semifinals where it will play at No. 2 seed Montana-Western in Dillon, Mont., on Saturday at 6 p.m. Great Falls, the No. 6 seed, ends its season at 12-18.

"It's very difficult to play a team four times," LCSC coach Brandon Rinta said after the Warriors improved to 4-0 against Great Falls this season. "It's really difficult for both teams.

But I thought our guys, defensively for the most part, were pretty good tonight. We didn't force them into too many turnovers, but we did hold them to 40 percent from the field."
There wasn't a lot of flash to Wednesday's win, but rather just the Warriors going to work and getting the job done.

"That's kind of the way it felt," Rinta said.  "I think the important thing was coming out of the gates at the first part of the game. It was a little bit slow offensively for the first couple of minutes, but then we were able to get it going."

LCSC led 16-14 when it went on a 9-0 run, which include five points from guard Derrick White. Great Falls managed to cut the lead to nine points twice, but five points from Zavon Jackson and a 3-pointer by Ty Higbie, his third of the first half, helped the Warriors push the lead to 42-29 at halftime.

"It wasn't like there were any big moments where we went on this big run, or put this stretch together, but we were able to get a lead in the first half," Rinta said.

In the second half, the Warriors kept the lead in double digits and led by as much as 18. Senior Doug McDaniel scored 17 of his game-high 19 points in the second half and had a run of 11 straight for the Warriors during the latter stages of the game when LC was able to put the game away.

"Our guys did a great job of taking care of the basketball and knocking down free throws," Rinta said. "We were 16-of-19 (at the foul line). That was big for us to shoot like that."
McDaniel was 8-of-16 from the field and added nine rebounds and three assists. Senior forward Zavon Jackson added a double-double with 13 points and 12 rebounds. He also had four assists.

"Doug got it going there in the second half," Rinta said. "And Zavon was huge tonight with another double-double. For him to go 5-for-5 at the foul line is big for us. It's been really big for us, especially in the second half of the season, for Zavon to step up there and knock down free throws. Throughout his career he hasn't been the best free-throw shooter, but it's a testament to him, he has really been working hard on it and spending a lot of time at the free-throw line. And it's really paying off for us. He makes good things happen when we get the ball inside to him, and for him to be able to knock down free throws on top of it, that was really the last piece for him."

Trea Thomas added 16 points, while Higbie finished with nine.

LCSC was 28-of-61 from the field for 45.9 percent and 11-of-29 from the 3-point line for 37.9 percent. Great Falls finished 27-of-67 for 40.3 percent, and 5-of-20 from the 3-point line for 25 percent. LCSC also had a 43-34 rebounding advantage, while both teams finished with 12 turnovers.

The Warriors now face Montana Western for the fourth time this season. LCSC beat Western by a point at home, but lost by 19 and 29 points at Dillon, the latter two weeks ago.

"We've got to defend them a whole lot better than we did both times there," Rinta said. "We just haven't been able to keep them in front of us, and in multiple ways, keep them from scoring."

The other semifinal on Saturday has No. 4 seed Montana State-Northern traveling to Carroll. The two semifinals winners will play next Tuesday for an automatic berth to the NAIA national tournament, which is March 15-21 in Kansas City, Mo.