But in the end, it was a similar story for most home games at Weber State this season: compete, keep it close, make a run, Blaise Threatt almost does it all, and the opponent gets out with a win.

Northern Colorado celebrated after a 68-63 victory to clinch the Big Sky’s regular-season championship and the upcoming tournament’s No. 1 seed, outlasting a Weber State side that successfully mucked up the nation’s best field-goal percentage offense for 40 minutes. WSU did not have enough to overcome a 12-6 difference from the 3-point line.

In his final home game, Threatt totaled 29 points, eight rebounds, four assists and four steals on 11-of-19 shooting for Weber State (11-21, 5-13 Big Sky). Freshman guard Trevor Hennig added 15 points and six rebounds, and Viljami Vartiainen made three 3s for nine points.

Fifth-year guard Jaron Rillie notched a career-high 24 points, adding eight rebounds, on a 4-of-7 mark from downtown to lead Northern Colorado (23-8, 15-3). Isaiah Hawthorne scored 15 points and Marcell McCreary tallied 14.

Shooting 51.3% as a team entering Monday, the Bears finished 21 of 58 for a season-low 36.2%.

“That doesn’t come without great energy and effort and buy-in from your players on a third game in five days,” WSU head coach Eric Duft said. “Credit to our players and the effort they put forth tonight because that’s a really hard team to defend.”

Northern Colorado’s largest lead in the first half came at 17-9. Threatt scored 10 points in the final 8:20 of the first half (16 total) and the Bears’ lead was just 24-23 at the break.

Threatt defense and a dish to Alex Tew helped Weber State take a 31-29 lead with 14:53 left. The Bears took over from there for a 24-9 extended run.

McCreary was the key to that run. While both teams struggled to score, McCreary tallied 12 straight points for his team, all from the 3-point line, over a span of 4 minutes. The first was a tough stepback to beat the shot clock, the last from the left wing set up by a smart screen to make it 44-38 with 8:30 left.

At that point, Northern Colorado had only 16 made field goals and 10 were from the 3-point line. The Bears’ final mark: 21 field goals, 12 of them 3-pointers.

Rillie helped push the visitors’ advantage to 53-40 with 5:12 left, capping the 24-9 run after WSU’s brief lead.

Somehow the game wasn’t over. Vartiainen and Hennig made consecutive 3-pointers and Threatt drove to the rim to make it 53-48 in a flash, forcing a NoCo timeout with 3:54 remaining.

The Bears came out of the timeout controlling both ends and a Hawthorne corner 3 made it 58-48 at the 2:00 mark.

WSU had one last gasp when Nemanja Sarenac made a free throw, then missed his second for a 62-57 score with 30.6 seconds left. A tip went to Threatt for a rebound but he found himself trapped on the baseline; he called timeout but WSU had none.

Rillie made one technical free throw. A Hennig jumper had the score to 63-59 with 25.3 seconds left but Northern Colorado made enough free throws to put the game away.

WSU wrapped up the lowest conference winning percentage (.278) and lowest conference finish (ninth) in program history. At 5-10 overall and 2-10 against Division I opponents, Weber also tallied the most home losses in a season in program history.

As the No. 9 seed, Weber State plays No. 10 Sacramento State at 5:30 p.m. Saturday to open the Big Sky tournament on the men’s side. The winner faces Northern Colorado on Sunday.