MBB: Kobe Brown, Missouri take down USU in first round of March Madness
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — After trading blows through the first 10 minutes after halftime, Missouri’s Kobe Brown took over to knock Utah State Men’s Basketball out of the NCAA Tournament 76-65.
Brown went off for 12-straight Tiger points, including three 3-pointers, in just over three minutes midway through the second half. His boost got Mizzou up by six points, 59-53.
“Brown was tremendous,” said USU head coach Ryan Odom. “Two really difficult threes. Obviously the first two going to the basket. I mean, he’s a load.”
From there, Tiger guard D’Moi Hodge poured in eight points to put Missouri up by double digits, 67-56, with three and a half minutes left.
During that same stretch of time, the Aggies struggled to keep the ball secure turning it over four times. Utah State was also having trouble drawing fouls from the contact they perceived.
When USU wasn’t getting the calls they wanted, the frustration boiled over and the Aggie bench picked up a technical foul. Missouri missed both shots but hit a 3-pointer on the ensuing possession. Utah State just could not stop the sharp-shooting Tigers, who hit five 3-pointers, including a couple of well-guarded ones, to blow the Aggies out of the Golden 1 Center.
That was after a grueling first half where the Tigers forced the Aggies off the perimeter and into the paint. It was Missouri’s game plan to take away the three and force USU into tough shots.
“We tried to force them to the basket to make them make two, make the big man score,” Hodge said. “Make them take tough threes, force them into bad shots. That helped us in the long run.”
Utah State outscored Missouri 46-26 in the paint, but that’s not how the Aggies are built to win.
“You got to understand at that point that’s not how they want to score, that’s not how they want the entire game to go,” said Missouri head coach Dennis Gates. “Our guys commend them. It’s hard to give up layups or different things, but they stayed disciplined and they did not over-rotate, which is one of the game plans we saw being used throughout their conference.”
USU guard Steven Ashworth credited the Tigers’ defense and bad luck to the Aggies’ struggle from the perimeter.
“There has to be some credit given to Missouri, their style of defense, what they like to do to teams,” Ashworth said. “At times, even if you’re getting open looks in those situations, you can be a little rushed into those shots. I think the first half we had a little bit of that. At the same time, it was we just weren’t hitting the shots we normally make. I know even some of them were just bad beats.”
Ashworth cited a triple from Funk that went in but was taken off the board when the officials said he stepped on the line out of bounds.
“That could have been the one to open it up in the first half,” Ashworth said.
Instead, the Aggies ended the first half without a 3-pointer made on 11 shots. Utah State turned it around a little in the second half with four made triples, but finished the game shooting 16.7% from beyond the arc.
However, USU didn’t take their blows lying down. During their climb back early in the second half, forward Taylor Funk hit a 3-pointer to tie the game at 39 four-and-a-half minutes into the half and then a layup to tie it again on the next possession but Missouri always had an answer.
“I think our philosophy is not blinking,” Gates said. “We didn’t blink no matter what the crowd noise was, no matter what the response or the plays that Utah State made.”
The Tigers responded with a 3-pointer from Hodge and a jump shot from Sean East II.
Later on, forward Dan Akin threw down two monster slams. But that provoked Brown to respond with his 12-point stretch.
“Immediately after he got those two dunks, after each one I was just telling my team, It’s just two points,” Brown said. “We got to get back, keep playing. Like getting two regular layups to us. Like (Gates) said, we don’t blink. We felt them getting the momentum, but we couldn’t show that. If we would have showed that, things would have went a lot different.”
Funk led USU with 16 points. Ashworth and Akin added 12 points each.
Utah State ends the season with a record of 26-9. The loss is the Aggies’ 10th straight loss in the NCAA Tournament and ninth straight first-round exit.
Featured image by Phil Weber.