Impressive defensive performance leads Aggies to victory
With an 86-48 win over Alabama State Saturday night, Utah State continued their streak of good home performances. The Aggies grabbed their seventh straight home win, dating back to last season.
Within the first five minutes of the first half, Utah State found themselves up 13-1 over the Hornets and showed no signs of slowing down. Their defense was smothering the ball, coming off switches, and rotating with ease which really stifled Alabama State and made every shot attempt a challenge. A couple of quick buckets under the basket from freshman center Neemias Queta proved Utah State the superior team early on. The Aggies were able to stretch their lead to as much as 21 points halfway through the first period before the Hornets started to gain a little momentum back from Utah State. A 30-9 lead quickly turned into a score of 37-26 with only two minutes left in the half. To Utah State’s credit, they were able to gain focus and shut Alabama State down the rest of the period and come away with a 44-28 lead at the half.
Yet again, junior guard Sam Merrill had a large contribution to the Aggies success in the first half. Merrill led the team with 11 points and four rebounds on an extremely efficient shooting performance, going 4 of 5 from the field. Both Merrill and sophomore guard Crew Ainge made a huge impact on both sides of the court with their intense work ethic and hunger to make hustle plays to gain possession for Utah State.
If the first half was any indication of how well this Aggies team was playing as a unit, the second half proved even more dynamic. For Utah State, it was a story of team play that led them to the 86-48 victory over Alabama State. Their defense held the Hornets to 20.7 percent shooting from the field, a season low for any team facing the Aggies.
This was a key point for USU head coach Craig Smith, who spoke about his team’s defensive success.
“We told the guys, I don’t care who you are, what level you’re playing, whether it’s the NBA, European, Australian, Division one; it doesn’t matter. To hold a team to 20 percent, that’s difficult to do,” Smith said.
As well as good defense, USU’s bench played a huge role in their success. On the night, they outscored the Hornets 30-29 in bench points, largely coming from 24 points between forwards Diogo Brito and Dwayne Brown Jr. 17 of those points came in the second half where Utah State seemed to find their groove in the game and assert dominance over the visiting Hornets.
Coach Smith seemed to be pleased with the balance the team showed in shouldering the scoring load.
“That’s kind of been the story of our year right?” Smith said. “Different guys were showing a lot of balance. Obviously Sam is our catalyst, but we’ve seen a lot of growth out of Neemias and a lot of our guys.”
All-in-all, the Aggies outscored their opponents 42-20 in the final period. But it wasn’t just the bench that led this team to victory. The starting five were a cohesive and dominant unit all game. Senior forward Quinn Taylor put in nine points to go along with nine rebounds, a team-high. Queta finished second on the team in points and rebounds, hauling down seven boards along with his 15 points. But maybe the most impressive performance of the night came from Crew Ainge, who set career-highs in multiple categories including points, rebounds, and minutes played. After beginning the year as a starter but only averaging 14 minutes per game, Ainge has made great strides over the past few games to improve his performance and earn more minutes in the squad.
Speaking about his performance, Ainge said, “I think it’s still an ongoing thing for me to gain confidence with my shot and offensively, but the drives were just there tonight. If I do score, if I’m an offensive threat, I think it opens up the rest of the floor for guys like Sam and Brock and Neemi who they really key in on.”
Since their loss to BYU ten days ago, Utah State has put together two solid performances against good opponents, and seem to have found their footing again through good defense and team play. The Aggies find themselves with a big matchup this coming Thursday against a top -25 school going up against Houston on the road. A win would not only earn the Aggies and coach Smith their tenth victory, but would make them the fastest group to do so in five years.