PORTLAND – The Vikings had four players score in double-figures led by Sidney Rielly's team-high 19 as Portland State improved to 2-0 in Big Sky Conference play with a 75-60 win over the Eastern Washington Eagles Thursday night at the Pamplin Sports Center.
 
The Vikings are 2-0 in conference play for the first time since the 2009-10 season. They went 18-15 overall that season and made the program's first NCAA Division I tournament appearance after winning the Big Sky tournament as the fifth seed after a 9-7 conference season. Portland State is also three games over .500 for the season since starting the 2012-13 year 5-1.
 
Portland State (8-5 overall, 2-0 Big Sky) shot 48.5 percent from the floor, while holding Eastern Washington (6-9, 1-2) to just 31.8 percent from the floor as the Vikings' zone shut down another conference opponent.
 
Rielly, a junior guard from Everett, Wash., scored 19 points on 9-of-16 shooting with a three-pointer. She has scored double-digit points in 14-consecutive games dating back to last season. She pulled down a career-high eight rebounds and had five assists, one shy of her career high, in 30 minutes of action.
 
Rielly was one of four players to record seven or more rebounds Thursday as the Vikings out-rebounded the Eagles 45-to-37. They turned 16 offensive rebounds into 19 seconds-chance points.
 
JR F Courtney West added a season-high 14 points on 7-of-8 shooting. She started the game 6-for-6 before missing her only shot of the game. She put together a complete performance, tallying seven rebounds along with four assists and matched her season high with five blocks.
 
Portland State dominated in the paint, outscoring Eastern Washington 44-20. A large part of the paint production was due to the efforts of JR F Pia Jurhar who scored 10 points off the bench, all coming in the paint. She went 5-for-6 from the floor and crashed the boards all night. She tallied eight rebounds, five coming on the offensive glass.
 
JR G Ashley Bolston added 15 pointes in the win, going 6-for-16 from the floor and 2-for-5 from deep. She pulled down eight rebounds and had three assists.
 
The first quarter played fairly evenly with neither team going up by more than two scores. The Vikings took an early 6-2 lead before the Eagles came back to tie it at 6-6. Eastern Washington took a brief lead at 14-13 but the Vikings ended the quarter on a 5-0 run to lead 18-14 at the end of one.
 
After trading baskets to begin the second, Portland State blew the game open with an 11-0 run to take a 15-point lead at 31-16. The teams traded baskets over the final 5:12 and the Vikings took a 37-23 lead into the break.
 
Portland State held Eastern Washington to just 30.3 percent shooting from the floor as the Vikings' defense kept the Eagles in check. Offensively, the Vikings moved the ball around extremely well shooting 53.1 percent in the first half. The Vikings recorded 13 assists on their 17 first-half field goals. For the game, Portland State tallied 23 assists, their fifth game of 20-or-more assists and fourth straight.
 
Eastern Washington popped Portland State in the mouth to open the third quarter and cut the lead to single-digits. The Vikings took the haymakers and kept on going. After EWU cut the lead to eight, PSU built up a 14-point lead on a three-pointer from FR G Kylie Jimenez with 3:45 left in the third. Jimenez finished the game with eight points and five assists.
 
Portland State ended the third quarter on a 6-0 run capped by a Jurhar offensive rebound and put-back at the buzzer to give the Vikings a 55-39 lead heading to the fourth.
 
The Vikings went up by as much as 19 points five different times during the fourth quarter before the Eagles scored the final four points of the game to make it a 75-60 win for the Vikings.
 
JR G Kiana Brown, who began her career at Eastern Washington, extended her consecutive games with a three-pointer streak to 13. She had five points and three assists in 28 minutes against her former team.
 
Both teams scored their season averages Thursday night. Portland State entered the game as the highest scoring team in the Big Sky, averaging 75.5 points per game. Eastern Washington came in as the lowest scoring team, putting up 60.9 ppg.
 
Eastern Washington's Violet Kapri Morrow had a game-high 25 points, going 6-for-16 from the floor and 4-for-10 from three-point range. She also went 9-for-12 from the floor as she had double the amount of free throw makes and attempts that Portland State did. The Vikings were only 4-for-5 from the line for the game.
 
The Vikings held EWU's leading scorer Delaney Hodgins to just 16 points, eight of which came in the fourth quarter when the game was well in hand.
 
Portland State closes out its season-long four game home stand Saturday when it hosts the Idaho Vandals at 1 p.m. PT. Idaho is 1-2 in league play after falling 79-64 at Sacramento State Thursday night.