Aggies fall to AFA
basketball team lost. This time 60-56 to an Air Force team missing its starting point guard.
The Aggies melted down for the fourth time this season including their two exhibition games. Up 11 points with 12 minutes left the Aggies only managed to score ten points the rest of the game as the Falcons went on a 25-10 run to close out their sixth win of the season.
“At 52-50 we were up and it almost was like we were down by eight,” Aggie center Jessica Freeman said. “That’s what it felt like and it shouldn’t.”
By then the team was almost completely deflated yet they still managed to miss three of four free throws, two of which were front ends of one-and-ones. The Aggies turned the ball over 16 times in the second half and sent the Falcons to the line 18 times. Air Force also grabbed 16 offensive rebounds in the game, a couple in the final minutes which helped the Falcons run down the clock.
“We have to handle things that are in our control,” Utah State Head Coach Raegan Pebley said. “I can’t call a play. I can’t have them shoot more free throws in practice. Its the mentality you bring on the court.”
Freeman scored 11 points and grabbed six rebounds but her lone turnover was a big one, she said.
“As a senior I’m going to take some of the blame,” Freeman said. “I feel like I had two major turnovers and I missed free throws at the end. I need to hit those.”
Her missed free throw was in the last two minutes. Her one-and-one opportunity was blown when she missed the front end preventing Utah State from tying the game 54-54.
The Falcons went to the line six times in the final minute, yet they made just two. It didn’t help Utah State at all, as Taylor Richards missed a lay-up with the score 58-53 and the Ags had to foul. After making the first one, Andrea Taylor missed her second free throw but the Falcons rebounded and got two more shots from the stripe.
Richards made a three-pointer with two seconds left but the game may as well have been over as the Falcons proceeded to miss their final two free throws.
Even though the Montana game ended in a similar fashion and the Ags did send Idaho State to the line 27 times in the second half of last weekends game, there is a pattern but it isn’t a habit, Freeman said.
The team does look complacent in the final minutes of games but losing isn’t a habit that anyone should be falling into and the losses can’t be blamed on being a young team anymore, Freeman said.
“We were stuck in the moment and we get complacent and we were OK with winning then,” Richards said. “We don’t know how to pull ahead of it.”
This wasn’t the first time it has happened and it may not be the last, but it’s one thing Richards said she won’t be able to deal with.
“It’s going to start wearing on people to where it doesn’t matter and that’s tough because I hate losing with a passion,” she said.
In the second half, freshman Lindsey Freeze had to come in when Brittany Tressler couldn’t stop her nose from bleeding after being fouled on a lay-up.
Freeze made the free throw for Tressler, grabbed a defensive rebound on the Falcon’s next possession and sank a 3-pointer the next trip down the court for the Ags. The points and rebound were her first of the season.
Utah State will play at home on Saturday against Utah Valley State College, who Air Force beat 97-70 earlier in the season. Freeman said the game is a must win but that’s also how she felt about Thursday nights match-up with Air Force.
-krn@cc.usu.edu