Broncos busted by Utah State

It was a win. And that’s all Stew Morrill cares about.

The Utah State men’s basketball team escaped with a 75-69 win over Boise State in the Spectrum Thursday despite turning the ball over 15 times.

“You can talk about all the ways we struggled, but it goes in the left hand column and that’s all that matters,” head coach Morrill said. “We dodged a bullet and got out with a win. We’re glad to be 2-2 [in conference play].”

USU shot 49 percent from the field compared to 35.5 percent for BSU and the Aggies held the Broncos to 8-for-27 from three-point range while the Aggies made half of the 20 long-range shots they took.

“When you look at the stats, you wonder why it was so close,” Morrill said. “But then you see the turnovers. We made some uncharacteristic plays that just weren’t us.”

Nate Harris led the Aggies with 20 points and eight rebounds despite playing limited time in the second half due to foul trouble.

“Any time a player of that caliber goes out, it’s a low blow,” Aggie Durrall Peterson said. “We’re used to having him out there.”

David Pak had four turnovers, but scored 11 points and was 3-for-6 from three point range, hitting a key three-pointer and two foul shots down the stretch to help the Aggies keep their slim lead.

“I’m tired of these close ones,” Pak said. “They took us out of what we were trying to do. Things could have gotten a lot better or a lot worse.”

BSU led the game by as many as five points early, but the Aggies went on a 22-6 run to take a 33-22 lead with three minutes to play in the first half. But the Broncos wouldn’t go away without a fight.

On four occasions in the second half, BSU cut its deficit to three points, but the Aggies would repel each Bronco rally to hold on to the six-point win.

“I thought [BSU] came out alive,” Morrill said. “It caught us by surprise how physical they were.”

Peterson said this is the kind of game that USU will see more of, but it will be up for the challenge.

“It was high intensity, but that’s league,” he said. “We pride ourselves on our toughness.”

For the first time this season, Peterson was not in the starting lineup. Chris Session got the start instead, but Peterson still saw 20 minutes of playing time to Session’s 13. Peterson didn’t feel any different about this game than the games he started.

“The thing with our system is everyone gets to play,” Peterson said. “Our starters are just the ones out for the jump ball.”

The Spectrum was filled with 8,573 fans Thursday night. Morrill had said earlier in the week that he wanted to see a big turnout for the game.

“I’m not demanding anything,” he said. “All I’m doing is asking for help as we go into the WAC.”

-bhhinton@cc.usu.edu