Aggies avoid disaster, rally against Spartans
Utah State got its third conference win of the season 81-63 over San Jose State, but midway through the first half, the Aggies looked to be heading straight for an embarrassing loss to the last-placed Spartans.
With 12:03 left in the first half, the Spartans (3-13, 0-4) held a 15-point lead 24-9. USU (13-5, 3-2) made just two of its first 10 shots and had six turnovers. San Jose was 7 of 13 from the field in that same span — 5 of 7 from three.
“I think we came out really slow and sluggish,” said freshman guard Tauriawn Knight. “And I don’t think we were really prepared.”
Spartans sophomore guard Noah Baumann scored 21 of his season-high 29 points in the first half, making 5 of 6 shots from three.
“Tonight, he gets two clean ones right away, then all of a sudden, he’s in the zone and that basket looks as big as Mars,” said USU head coach Craig Smith. “We made some good adjustments. I thought Diogo (Brito) did a really good job once we put him on Baumann, but we waited til he had 18 points before we switched that match-up.”
The Aggies eventually threw off the sluggish start and finished the first half on a 32-9 run, taking a 41-35 into the halftime break. In that run, the team didn’t turn it over once and shot 56.5 percent from the field.
“We did what we needed to do to win the game,” Smith said.
Brito spearheaded the rally not only by guarding Baumann for much of the second half, but also by scoring a career-high 23 points on an also career-best five 3-pointers made. The junior guard also led the Aggies in assists with six and had five rebounds.
One player whose numbers don’t stand out on the stat but had an impact nonetheless was redshirt freshman Justin Bean.
“I thought Justin Bean was really, really good,” Smith said. “His plus/minus differential was off the charts. He only got four points, but had two assists, three steals and was really good on the defensive end.”
Bean had a plus/minus of plus-24 in the game, second on the team behind Knight (plus-28) and just ahead of Brito (plus-22).
Brito, Bean and Knight led the charge in the second half where USU maintained the dominance it established late in the first half. Brito and Knight scored over half (21) of the teams 40 second-half points.
Five Aggies ended up scoring in double figures: Brito, Neemias Queta (14), Brock Miller (13), Sam Merrill (12) and Knight (10). Queta had nine rebounds and a block, continuing his streak of now 18 games with at least one rejection.