POCATELLO - Again and again, the Idaho State women's basketball team used the same word to describe its 71-54 home win over Eastern Washington on Thursday: "fun."

Coach Seton Sobolewski admitted he has a better time coaching with the lead than with the Bengals desperately chasing after an opponent.

Junior post Oana Iacovita spoke glowingly about playing Idaho State's aggressive brand of defense.

Senior point guard Jenna Brown may have had the best time of all the Bengals. She scored a career-high 19 points and tortured the Eagles all night with drives, passes, scrappy rebounds … you name it. Three other Bengals scored in double digits to help Idaho State cruise to its second consecutive win to begin Big Sky play.

"I know I had fun," Brown said. "When it's a tight game and you know you're not playing as well as you can, it's not as much fun. But when you're getting stops on defense and you're taking good shots, that's fun. And that's when we play our best."

Eastern Washington (7-9, 2-1 Big Sky) started the game looking nothing like a perennial conference doormat. The Eagles entered Thursday's contest having already doubled their conference win total from last season and raced to a 23-18 lead with five minutes remaining in the first half.

That's when the Bengals (5-10, 2-0) began to impose their will on the Eagles. They outscored the Eagles 53-31 the rest of the way, beginning with a 17-6 run to end the first half. During the span, Brown earned repeated trips to the foul line with drives off screens and drained six foul shots. She also assisted on another basket.

Brown finished with five rebounds and four assists and could have had more, if not for several misses by teammates off her drive-and-kicks.

"She's drawing some attention," Sobolewski said. "Jenna's been making some incredible passes, I mean, some tough passes, falling out of bounds, one-handed. It might take two bounces to get to them, but she's delivering the passes."

Brown cooled off slightly in the second half, but the Bengals didn't with Iacovita catching Brown's hot shooting touch. She scored 12 of her 18 points in the second half with nifty post moves. Twice, she fooled her defender with pump fakes and glided into the paint for open layups.

Iacovita hadn't enjoyed such a productive day on offense since she scored 16 in a loss to Wyoming on Dec. 6.

"I don't know; they just fell for it," Iacovita said of her moves. "Coach has been after me to not settle for jump shots only, so now I'm trying to do something else."

Michelle Grohs added 13 points and Chelsea Pickering 12. But the duo made perhaps their biggest contributions on defense, combining for two blocks and six steals.

By forcing 15 Eastern Washington turnovers, Idaho State steadily pulled away after halftime and never looked in danger of dropping the game. The Eagles never got within 10 points after the 17:18 mark of the second half.

"Being more aggressive on defense is a good thing," Iacovita said. "If you stay back and let them score and you score another point and so on, it's not that fun. But when you get some stops, it gets you going."

Now sporting a 2-0 conference record, Idaho State joined Montana and Portland State as the only unbeatens in the Big Sky.

And, as Brown succintly boiled it down, "That felt good."