Streak finally snapped at Boise
All good things must come to an end.
Saturday night in Boise, that’s what happened to the Aggies national best 19-game winning streak, unbeaten conference record and a shot at setting a new school record for consecutive wins.
Boise State, aided by Aggie turnovers that piled up like their wins, knocked off first place Utah State, 66-56, stopping USU’s first attempt to win their first WAC regular season conference title outright.
“I thought we might get beat sometime,” USU head coach Stew Morrill said. “But I didn’t see it coming – we got outscratched and outclawed.”
Things started out well for the Aggies as they jumped out to a five-point lead 10 minutes into the game on a umper by Gary Wilkinson. Shortly after that, though, the Ags took a blow when Tai Wesley was whistled for his third personal foul.
“The first half I got frazzled – I played four minutes and had three fouls,” Wesley said. “That kind of just took me right out of the game and it was kind of hard for me to find a rhythm the whole second half because of that.”
Wilkinson got into some foul trouble early, as well, causing both Aggie big men to head to the bench. Nonetheless, USU was able to stay even with the Broncos and looked to be heading into the locker room with a lead until Boise State’s Anthony Thomas hit a 3-pointer just before the buzzer to put the Broncos up 27-25 at the half.
As a team, the Aggies, who have been leading the nation in shooting percentage, shot just 42 percent in the first half, including just 33 percent from beyond the arc. More telling, though, was the fact that the Aggies – who normally make their living at the free-throw line – only made one trip in the first half.
USU has seemingly owned its opponents in the second half of games this season. So, despite their first half struggles, the Aggies felt good going into the second half.
However, this second half had a different script.
Boise State used five of the Aggies’ 19 turnovers to go on a 14-4 run and break the game open at 41-29 just six minutes in to the second period.
The run was spurred by Thomas who continued his hot shooting from 3-point land, knocking down two 3s during the stretch. He finished with 18 points and a game-high three steals. Mark Sanchez who pumped in 20 points on 8-of-12 shooting led all scorers.
Despite finding themselves in the biggest hole of the season, the Aggies weren’t about to throw in the towel. A 3-pointer by Jaxon Myaer with 10:50 to play cut the lead to five, and a Brady Jardine layup off of a Wesley missed free-throw pulled USU within six, but each run was thwarted by turnovers and poor execution.
The Aggies, who had been so solid in the second half of games all season, only managed to shoot 31 percent in the final period and finished with a season-low 36.5 percent from the field.
Wilkinson and Jared Quayle each scored 12 points to lead the Aggies while sophomore Pooh Williams finished with 10 points – all in the first half – as he kept the Aggies in the game.
USU return tonight when they play host to CS Bakersfield, and then will head to St. Mary’s for an ESPN Bracketbuster matchup Saturday. The Aggies will have another opportunity to wrap up the regular season WAC title at home on Feb. 26 against Hawaii.
“Our main focus is to win the WAC,” guard Tyler Newbold said. “We need to get ready to practice and get ready for these two games and get better so that we can have a chance to come back and win the WAC outright.