Why I hated the MW tournament
As a sports writer, when I watch a game I don’t normally get too emotionally involved.
I’m pretty good at taking a step back, observing, looking at stats and objectively coming to a conclusion of what happened during the game. I see good calls, I see bad calls and I see strange calls but I recognize that they usually balance themselves out because the sun still burns and the earth still turns. All right, I don’t know why they balance but they do.
With that being said, I completely lost all objectivity and ability to accurately report after the Utah State men’s basketball second-round exit from the Mountain West tournament in Las Vegas last week.
Refereeing in the MW has been unfortunately inconsistent all season long but as I mentioned, that’s ok because somehow it works out.
Well, we reached that final tipping point and guess what — it didn’t work out. Utah State basketball got completely hosed by what looked like the MW attempt to protect the chance that its conference would get multiple bids to the NCAA tournament.
Let’s begin with the foul-turned-no-foul call on Zylan Cheatham. Cheatham gets a rebound, takes his right arm off the ball and takes a shot at the upper thigh or lower stomach — you get the idea here — of USU’s Lew Evans. The referee sees it, calls a foul and then it goes to get reviewed for being flagrant or not.
At this point, there was 1:52 on the clock and the Aggies were up by two. Getting the ball back, getting to shoot free throws, anything would have given USU a better chance to win. However, the refs see fit to un-call the foul completely, which, I’ve never seen before and was absolutely ridiculous. Evans played it up for sure but at the very least, it was a foul. Instead, the Aztecs got the ball and promptly tied the game at 61 with 1:32 to play.
“The explanation given to me was when they blow the whistle they can go over and look at it and they can take the foul back,” said USU coach Tim Duryea. “They determined that it was not an intentional foul. It was not a flagrant foul. And then they determined that it was not a foul. So in their opinion it basically becomes like a play on without the whistle blowing.”
Aztecs’ head coach Steve Fisher didn’t offer much of an explanation which made it seem even more mysterious to me.
Verbatim the reporter said, “What did the officials tell you on Zylan’s call? Tony (Padilla, one of the refs) came over to us and said, ‘We can change it.’ But what did he tell you?”
“Well, he didn’t say anything other than, you know — he did say something, but I won’t repeat what he said,” Fisher said.
Then, with three seconds to play, Shane Rector was shooting a half-court 3-pointer and was fouled, however the officials didn’t award him three free-throw shots. Rector hit two shots and brought the Aggies within one 66-65. Then things get ridiculous.
Julion Pearre gets called for an intentional foul on the inbounds play with, giving SDSU two shots and the ball. They made both, essentially ending the game on a referees’ judgement call.
On the ensuing inbounds play Rector was called for a foul, it was reviewed and determined flagrant. That gave SDSU two shots and the ball, again. That’s when I lost it. It felt like the refs had gifted the game to San Diego State on a golden platter. Fisher even agreed with me.
“We’ve had games just like this in our 18-game schedule and it prepares you. It prepares you for these kind of moments, we responded and found a way to be playing tomorrow,” Fisher said. “And for that we’re very appreciative.”
It’s the last sentence here that really grinds my gears. Where I come from you don’t appreciate a win. You earn it.
The best part of the entire scenario is that the beloved San Diego State didn’t actually get into the tournament. Good job Mountain West, you ruined the game.
— Kalen is a junior majoring in broadcast journalism. He’s still trying to get back to writing subjectively but feels a lot better now this is off his chest. If you would like to comment, get at him on Twitter: @kalen_taylor or via email at kalen.s.taylor@gmail.com.