MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — Tuburu Niavalurua’s 21 points helped Oakland defeat Lamar 83-68 on Monday, the Golden Grizzlies’ first game of the Blaine Taylor Classic in Dahlberg Arena on the campus of the University of Montana.
Niavalurua added three steals for the Golden Grizzlies (2-5). Michael Houge scored 16 points and added eight rebounds. Isaac Garrett had 16 points and shot 7 of 10 from the field and 2 of 4 from the free-throw line.
Andrew Holifield finished with 15 points, nine rebounds and two blocks for the Cardinals (3-2). Rob Lee Jr. added 13 points for Lamar. Errol White had 11 points and seven rebounds.
“Lamar is really good. They’re 6-foot-0, 6-11, and they rebound. They press the whole court, the whole length of the game,” head coach Greg Kampe said.
“They’re physical and we handled it. We handled it and every time they made their little run, we were able to get the ball inside and play through our strengths. And with (fifth-year player) Michael Houge back — I’ve told people — with that front line back and it’s really, really good. We were 3-for-17 from 3(-point range) on the road against a really good team and we won by 15, think about that.”
The Golden Grizzlies had 22 points on 16 Lamar turnovers, along with 48 points in the paint. Houge had 16 points and two blocks, along with eight rebounds in his second career game for Oakland.
Oakland is scheduled to play tourney host Montana on Tuesday (ESPN-plus).
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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.