Men’s hoops cruises past Wyoming for fifth straight win
Make it five straight wins and eight of the last nine for Utah State as they downed Wyoming 78-58 Wednesday evening behind two 20-point nights from Sam Merrill (24) and Justin Bean (20).
It almost wouldn’t be a Utah State game without the Aggies having a slow start to the contest, and they didn’t disappoint in that regard. Wyoming kept the game quite close for the first 15 minutes or so of the game, even taking a brief 18-17 lead at the 10:02 mark that was the end result of a 7-0 Cowboys run.
“It was a battle, they hung in there. I thought in the first half especially we didn’t do a great job of handling the ball and handling their pressure.” Bean said.
While spectators were likely surprised by Wyoming keeping pace with the Aggies, head coach Craig Smith said he believes the Cowboys are “playing their best basketball of the year”
“I know their record isn’t where they want it to be, I understand that,” Smith said, “but they led wire-to-wire the other day against Colorado State. I think the first time Colorado State took the lead was with about a minute to go, actually less than that. They led almost the whole game against Boise State. Now granted both of those were at home and then they beat San Jose (State).”
Both Smith and Bean noted Wyoming’s ability to turn a game ugly. The Cowboys did so early and the Aggies obliged with seven turnovers in the first 10 minutes of the game.
“Just some decisions that were pretty uncharacteristic of us,” Bean said.
The Aggies did have a lifeline while they struggled in the murky early-game waters. Abel Porter accounted for seven of the team’s first nine points, five of those points coming on his own shots and the other two being a laser pass to Bean who finished with a layup.
Porter had 10 points at halftime and was enjoying shooting numbers he hasn’t had all year. Prior to Wednesday’s game, the junior guard 38.5 percent from the field all year and 28.8 percent from downtown.
“He really got us rolling tonight,” Smith said of Porter. “We need that out of him. Abel’s a good player and so it was exciting. I thought he was just aggressive, his mindset was really, really good.”
The breakthrough moment for Utah State in the first half to blow the game open was more of a breakthrough three minutes and comprised of a 14-0 run. That made up the lion’s share of a 16-2 run the Aggies closed the half on that took a three-point game to a 15-point game at the halftime break.
No one player dominated during USU’s late-half run and the halftime box score reflected the team’s democratic scoring ways. Three Aggies — Merrill, Bean and Porter — had already reached double-figures.
Just as key to the push by the offense was the lockdown nature of the defense. Wyoming didn’t make a single field goal in the final four minutes of the first half, only getting points on a pair of made free throws 34 seconds before heading into the locker room.
Among other reasons Utah State pulled away and stayed ahead: the 29 combined rebounds from Bean (14) and Neemias Queta (15). That total exceeded Wyoming’s team rebound tally for the night by four.
“They’re not a great rebounding team typically,” Bean said. “They just don’t send a lot of guys on the offensive glass and so I think we took advantage of that. And we’re a great rebounding team, we definitely pride ourselves on that so it’s just a matter of going out and getting it.”
However, the tough-nosed rebounding wasn’t there from the beginning of the game and the Aggies had to adjust.
“But coach told us in one of the media timeouts that we’ve got to play better, we’ve got to be smarter and trust each other more and I thought we did that,” Bean said.
Once ahead by double-digits in the second, Utah State never truly relented. Though there were rough patches, such as an 0 for 7 shooting stretch across five minutes of the latter half, Wyoming never drew closer than 10 points after the break.
This mid-week victory and recent run of form pushes the Aggies closer and closer to sealing the second seed in the conference tournament. They are a half game ahead of Nevada (10-5 in conference play) but also hold the tie-breaker over the Wolf Pack thanks to the Aggies’ 80-70 victory over them on Jan. 11. Utah State also holds the tiebreaker over fourth place Colorado State (9-6).
Twitter: @thejwalk67