Aggies rebound from UCI loss
The Utah State Aggies were looking for intensity Saturday evening and found it in one of the most unique places: The mouth of basketball Head Coach Stew Morrill.
With 9:30 remaining in the second half and the Aggies trailing the Long Beach State 49ers by one point, 50-49, a third paper airplane of the night descended from the upper seats of the Spectrum and landed close to Morrill. The crowd had already received one warning of what would happen if debris was thrown on the floor. Morrill then decided to take matters into his own hands.
“Let’s not through s— on the floor,” Morrill finally said after stuttering to find the right words. “Let’s have some class out here. It’s gonna cost a technical.”
Utah State had already received one technical foul earlier in the season as fans threw toilet paper onto the court following the first basket of the 90-81 win over BYU in December.
Prior to Thursday’s 67-66 loss to the University of California, Irvine, Morrill urged fans not to throw things on the floor.
“We don’t need to start the game with a technical [foul]. Let’s show the country who’s watching [the nationally televised game on ESPN2] that we know the ’70s are gone,” he said.
Following the statement by Morrill, the Aggies went on to outscore Long Beach 21-16, leading to the 70-66 victory.
“[Coach Morrill] said, ‘Somebody’s got to bring the intensity,’ and I guess everyone was waiting for someone else to bring it,” USU forward Desmond Penigar said. “And then coach got on that mic and … whew. He brought the intensity. He started stuttering; man, that was funny. He doesn’t stutter like that in practice.”
Penigar led the Aggies with 26 points and 11 rebounds.
USU forward Tony Brown proclaimed he was ‘cured’ from a sickness earlier in the week and contributed 15 points while center Jeremy Vauge recorded 13 points.
Penigar was not the only Aggie who found humor in Morrill’s crowd-silencing speech.
“We loved it. We love to see coach fired up,” USU forward Brennan Ray said. “I’ve been with him so long I can just sit back and laugh at some of the things he does. We definitely fed off of him tonight.”
Ray tied his career-high eight points, shooting perfect (3-for-3) from the field.
The 49ers built an early lead as Travis Reed and Tony Darden combined for 21 of the teams 36 first-half points. Reed and Darden finished the game with 18 and 13 points, respectively.
Prior to playing five of the next seven games on the road, Morrill feels the win was important for the confidence of the team.
“When you win 31 straight at home and if we would have dropped two in a row at home that would have been really tough,” Morrill said. “Confidence is an amazing thing. Hopefully, [the win] will help us get our confidence back up.”