Aggies head to Fort Collins with chance to win regular season MWC title
“A huge game for the Aggies coming up against Colorado State,” said Utah State men’s basketball head coach Craig Smith. “We’re coming off an emotional week, a fantastic week, sweeping San Diego State and Nevada, splitting the series with both of those guys. Now the Aggies are in first place by half a game.”
Utah State has a chance to do something the program hasn’t done since the 2010-11 season, and not since joining the Mountain West — Earn at least a share of a conference regular season title. With a win on tonight, Utah State would finish conference play with a 15-3 record, and would share the conference title with Nevada if the Wolf Pack wins its final two games of the season.
But for the Aggies, the key is beating Colorado State first and foremost.
“They’re led by Nico Carvacho who is leading the country in rebounding,” Smith said. “Obviously he’s a really good player. He’s a veteran guy, averaging 18 points a game and 13.6 rebounds a game in Mountain West play. Those are some phenomenal numbers.”
In the previous matchup between these two teams earlier this season, the Aggies were able to hold Carvacho to 12 points on the night, his second lowest total in conference play. The Rams shot the ball well on that night, going 10-24 from three and 45 percent from the field overall. However, the Aggies were able to dominate the Rams on the boards, out-rebounding them 37 to 19 on the night.
Although Colorado State has the top rebounder in the country in Carvacho, as a team they rank eighth in the conference in team rebounding. At 32.0 per game they pull down five fewer than Utah State who is first in the conference at 37.1 per game.
Two Aggie big men, senior Quinn Taylor and freshman Neemias Queta, had a great night in the last meeting. The two combined for 30 points and 20 rebounds and defensively allowed just 20 points in the paint. Some extra motivation going up against another elite big man might have sparked some of Queta’s performance that night.
“Neemi is a guy with great pride,” Smith said. “He knows how good Carvacho is. He’s going to be ready to play. He knew what was going on that way. I think that was the game Neemi got a steal and went coast-to-coast. Our whole team was really motivated. That was a pivotal point in our season. We started out league play 1-2.”
Utah State had one of its better performances offensively of the season the last time these two teams met.
“The key was that we shot really well from three,” Smith said. “We went 12-for-25, shot 54 percent. That was the difference. That was one of our better offensive games this season with 23 assists to 13 turnovers.”
Not only did the Aggies shoot well from three, the team had five players score in double figures. Redshirt freshman guard Brock Miller had his highest scoring game in conference play, scoring a team-high 18 points.
This was one of the few games this season that junior guard Sam Merrill hasn’t led the Aggies in scoring. However, Merrill is coming off a week in which he played all 80 minutes, scored 24 points per game and earned his first conference player of the week honors.
“He never ceases to amaze you and he’s just so unassuming in how he does his thing,” Smith said. “He’s averaging 20 a game. It’s the quietest 20, It’s so quiet how he does it. It’s not just that, but how he’s distributing the ball. He’s so unselfish and so efficient in everything he does.”
After beating Nevada Saturday night, Utah State is now locked into one of the top two spots in the conference standings, regardless of the the result against Colorado State. But a win on Tuesday night would be a small slice of history for the Utah State basketball program and a banner raised.
Twitter: @dren_sports