PORTLAND, Ore. — It’s never easy to win away from your home court.

So when you do, it just means a little more. This edition of the Idaho State women’s basketball team is seemingly becoming very comfortable playing away from Reed Gym.

Saturday afternoon’s 72-63 win at Portland State improved its record to 9-4 on the year, 2-0 in Big Sky play, and most impressive of all, 6-3 on the road. The last six games played have all been on the road and ISU went 4-2 in them. Saturday’s victory was also Idaho State’s 27th win in the last 31 meetings with PSU.

But the Bengals had to earn it. Portland State fought them every step of the way. Twice ISU had 10-point leads, but the Vikings refused to quit. They sliced the lead down to a single-possession game before the Bengals made the plays down the stretch to seal the win.

“I thought we did a great job,” said ISU head coach Seton Sobolewski. “They gave us a great run. We had to fight back. I’m just proud of our efforts. Portland State came out and did a great job, really hurting us on the offensive glass. They got to six, seven offensive rebounds and we had none. And so we had to kick it into another gear. And once our offensive rebounding picked up, our offense in general got better.”

PSU had cut the Bengals’ lead to 62-60 with four minutes to go when Kasey Spink, who is not known for shooting the 3, made a clutch one from the wing to give ISU some breathing room. It was her second made 3-pointer of the afternoon and a big one.

The Bengals, like Thursday in their win at Sacramento State, didn’t shoot the ball well in the fourth quarter, only 29%, but they went 7-of-9 from the free throw line with all the makes coming in those last four minutes to keep the lead.

Idaho State got off to a great start, again like Thursday, and had a 17-10 lead after the first quarter. But the Vikings came out, hit back-to-back 3s to open the second, and the game was on.

It was freshman Maeva Gauffrenet who paced ISU in the first half. She nailed a trio of 3-point shots to help ISU either maintain a slim lead or cut a six-point Portland State edge down to a manageable number when they went on their run.

Sobolewski was asked about the French native who is still adapting to the U.S. style of play.

“She’s just got talent. She’s put a lot of time in the gym,” he said. “Maeva is going to be a really good 3-point shooter, a really good player as she gets more and more experience.”

Then in the second half, it was ISU’s most reliable player, Tasia Jordan, who took over.

Time and again she’d slash into the lane for a layup or a pull-up jumper that more often than not went in. She finished the game with 20 points, 12 in the second half.

She led four Bengal players in double figures. Gauffrenet had 13, Caldwell had 11, and Piper Carlson added her third double-double of the season, 10 points and 12 rebounds.

Spink had nine points, eight rebounds, five assists and two steals. Those eight rebounds pushed her into 10th all-time in program history for that category, passing Lindsey Reed. She’s on pace to become the 10th player to ever have at least 700 rebounds in a career.

Caldwell had her second straight double-figure scoring game and dropped in 25 points in the two-game road trip to help with the offensive punch.

ISU also broke a streak of four straight games with at least 20 turnovers, committing only 10 at Viking Pavilion.

The Bengals shot 40% for the game and 89% from the free throw line in winning their fourth in a row.

The Vikings with the loss dropped to 5-9 on the year and 1-1 in the Big Sky. Portland State sophomore Kyliegh Brown was the game’s high scorer with 23 points, CiCi Ellington, a seventh-year player, had 14 points and 11 rebounds, and Australian freshman Hannah Chicken scored 12 points.

Now Idaho State finally returns home for the first time since Dec. 3 to face maybe the surprise team in the league in Northern Colorado.

The Bears, who weren’t picked very high in the preseason polls, have already won 10 games, boast a powerful front line and, in Texas State transfer Heather Baymon, have a prolific scorer. She’s coming off back-to-back games in which she scored 26 and 29 points. Her 29 points on Saturday against Montana included seven 3-point shots.

The game will tip off at 7 p.m. from Reed Gym.