Merrill scores 28, Bean goes for career high in Utah State’s 84-57 win over Eastern Oregon
The first half for the Utah State men’s basketball team looked much like previous Utah State basketball games: a slow start which allowed the opponent to find its way into the ball game.
About halfway through the first half, Utah State found themselves holding onto a one point lead of 11-10, with the visiting Eastern Oregon squad looking confident as they hoped to turn this game into a 12 round knockout. Although EOU wasn’t able to find much of an offensive attack in the paint, they were getting some good looks from the perimeter, doing an excellent job of exploiting USU late in the shot clock.
Utah State head coach Craig Smith was visibly unhappy about the way things were going for his squad. This came down to a combination of things according to coach.
“They got us standing, we were really stationary, I thought we were really sticky with,” Smith said. “Then once we started to settle in and understand how to attack it (their 3-2 zone) and get it moving we did a much better job.”
Smith also mentioned that it’s typically hard to find a rhythm after having long periods off from being on the court.
“You have Christmas break where you are off for five days, hadn’t seen that for quite some time, so obviously we worked on it a lot Monday, our first day back,” he said. “I don’t know if you saw the NBA clip where the ball was bouncing all over the place, where it hit the guy in the knee, hit the guy in the head, off the elbow; that was our first day back of practice. Which is typical the day after five days off.”
However, one bright spot for the Aggies was the amount of aggression junior guard Sam Merrill showed in the first half to get shots off. Merrill finished with nearly half of the Aggies’ points in the first half with 20, and was attacking the rim almost every trip down the court. To go along with a near 30-point performance, Merrill did it the only way he knows how: efficiently. In only 26 minutes, the junior guard converted 9-of-14 shots, 4-of-7 from three, and a perfect 6-of-6 from the free throw line.
Merrill’s scoring prowess, in synthesis with some good contributions from the bench as well as eight points from freshman center Neemias Queta, played a major role in Utah State’s ability to pull ahead late in the first half.
Merrill was pleased with his performance on the night after a shaky outing of 2-of-9 shooting for just six points last week in Houston.
“Yeah I was really disappointed with the way I played at Houston, just felt like we had a really good opportunity there and didn’t shoot the ball quite the way I wanted to,” Merrill said. “I put in quite a bit of work over the break and you was able to find some gaps in their defense and was able to finally get some confidence from three and shots were falling, so hopefully that translates to Wednesday.”
Whatever it was that coach Smith said to the team at half seemed to work because the Aggies came out flying to start the second half. Within the first few minutes, Utah State had jumped out to a 57-31 lead, all of this coming from players not named Sam Merrill. In fact, it wasn’t until the 9:07 mark of the second half that Merrill found his first points of the half.
The real standouts of the half were some unusual suspects. After scoring no points in the first half, freshman guard Brock Miller was one of two leading scorers for the Aggies in the second, putting in nine along with freshman forward Justin Bean. Bean scored a career-high 12 points to go along with seven rebounds in only 18 minutes.
“I think there’s no telling when I’m going to go in, but when I do, I just try to make the most of it,” Bean said of his performance. “You know that’s something that me and Neemias have a little battle over; who’s the better offensive rebounder in practice and that seems to help out a lot. You know it really comes down to an effort thing.”
Overall, that’s what it was for the Aggies on the night. From being down by one in the first half, to being up by as many as 34 in the second. When the Aggies put forth the effort and played their brand of basketball, defensively immovable and offensively lethal, they couldn’t be stopped. Having guys off the bench like Abel Porter scoring five, Bean with 12, in combination all adding up to one complete unit.
The final score of 84-57 both encapsulated how dominant the Aggies were and how much they can improve before they start a grueling conference schedule Wednesday in Reno, Nev. against the undefeated, No. 6 ranked team in the nation Nevada Wolfpack.
Utah State finished non-conference play with a 10-3 record, two of their three losses coming to top-20 opponents on the road.