MBB: Funk scores 32, Aggies knock out New Mexico
LAS VEGAS — Just before tipoff, Utah State forward Taylor Funk walked onto the court, faced the USU student section and did his signature swipe across his upper lip and flick down.
He was ready, but his first shot rattled off the rim. Funk shook it off and proceeded to hit his next six shots from the field to rack up the Aggies’ first 16 points, while New Mexico was held to just six points in the first five minutes.
“Yeah, definitely feeling it a little bit in the start,” Funk said. “Credit to all the other guys on the floor. They set screens and passed me the ball at the right time, and then it’s just your responsibility to knock the shot down.”
“No secret Taylor got off to a blazing hot start for us,” USU head coach Ryan Odom added.
Funk finished with a season-high 32 points to lead Utah State past New Mexico 91-76 in the quarter-final round of the Mountain West Men’s Basketball Championship. With the victory, the Aggies advance to the semi-final round of the tournament for the fifth time in the last six seasons.
Funk set the tone offensively at the start of the game leading Utah State to a 16-4 lead in the first four minutes, but it didn’t take too long for the Lobos to start chipping away.
New Mexico started putting pairs of baskets together when they got stops, but when the Aggie lead got down to eight points midway through the half, guard Steven Ashworth hit back-to-back 3-pointers — although UNM got a layup between them — to put USU back up 12 points, 33-21.
Ashworth sunk another triple to respond to a four-point burst a few minutes later to keep the Aggies up 38-27.
New Mexico got to the line to score eight of their last 10 in the final few minutes of the half, but USU forward Dan Akin put in a couple of dunks to help Utah State to a halftime lead of 44-33.
Out of the break, New Mexico got the deficit down to six points, 49-43, but USU responded with an 8-0 run behind Funk, Ashwork and guard RJ Eytle-Rock to build the lead to 57-43.
Halfway through the second, USU got into foul trouble during a few minutes as the referees tightened up play and were quick to their whistles.
“Coach kind of got on us because we had the lead for sure, and we didn’t want that clock to stop, but we just kept fouling,” Funk said. “We definitely need to learn from that. Guard without fouling and just keep that clock ticking.”
With just over nine minutes remaining, Ashworth picked up his fourth personal foul sending him to the bench. That opened up an opportunity for New Mexico and the Lobos took it launching a 13-3 run over the three and a half minutes. The run drained Utah State’s lead from 72-54 to 75-67.
Akin stopped the bleeding with a dunk and Shulga got going from the free-throw line to keep Utah State’s lead at double-digits the rest of the way.
In the final minutes, Utah State got to the free-throw line and hit eight foul shots to keep New Mexico at bay, while the Lobos would only hit three more shots from the field in the final five minutes. A two-handed jam from Funk was the cherry on top of a 91-76 Aggie victory.
“It was a big-time college basketball game,” Odom said.
Along with Funk’s 32 points, Ashworth poured in 22 points. They combined to hit 10 3-pointers as the three-ball was Utah State’s friend tonight. The Aggies shot 50% from behind the arc sinking 12 of their 24 attempts.
USU improves to 25-7 with the win and will face Boise State Friday night in the semi-final round at 10 p.m. MST. The game will be broadcast on Aggie Radio 92.3 FM.
Featured image by Heidi Bingham.