USU Men’s Hoops Lose Second Straight Game Against Boise State
Utah State had opportunities to come out of Extra Mile Arena with a victory Friday day night but ultimately, it was the Boise State that made the plays necessary to win. The Aggies fell 81 to 77, spoiling their aspirations of winning the Mountain West regular-season championship.
For the second game in a row, USU’s defense struggled to be their dominant selves in the second half, giving up 51 points on 17 of 23 attempted shots and failing to come up with stops down the stretch.
“I’m very disappointed in tonight’s loss, it’s a tough one to handle,” said USU coach Craig Smith. “You’re not going to beat a really good team by allowing them to shoot 74 percent in a half. We just gotta be better.”
The Aggies led by seven at halftime and extended the lead to nine early in the second half. But things seemed to break down, and the Broncos went on a 13-4 run to tie the game at 45.
Boise State found success in creating separation from Aggie defenders and didn’t seem to miss open shots. Derrick Alston proved to be nearly unstoppable in the second half, scoring 14 points. Three additional Bronco players finished with double digits: Abu Kigab (19), Mladen Armus (13), and RayJ Dennis (10.)
“They hit us a little bit everywhere which is concerning,” said Smith. “Because sometimes it’s your post defense, sometimes it’s just guarding the ball, sometimes it’s your screen and roll defense, sometimes it’s your transition defense, sometimes it’s rebounding…I don’t know if we were great in any area and that’s not us.”
Despite the defensive lapses, USU continued to battle, in large part to the efforts of junior Neemias Queta. Nearly matching his career-high 32 points performance from Wendesday night’s defeat, the center had 30 points – the first Aggie to score 30 plus in back-to-back games since Jaycee Carroll in 2007 – and hit seven of nine shot attempts in the second half to keep the Aggies on pace.
Utah State as a whole would shoot better than Wendesday night, 33 of 66 from the field and 4 of 14 from beyond the arch. Junior Justin Bean had 11 points and junior Brock Miller had ten.
With the game tied at 71 with two minutes to play, Boise State’s Mladen Armus knocked down a jumper to give the hosts a lead. Anthony responded by hitting one of two free throws. Then Armus came and split Bean and Queta for a contested layup to make it a three-point game. After a Bean turnover, Kigab hit two free throws to make it 77-72 with 1:23 to play.
But the Aggies still had life. Miller knocked down a deep three to make it 78-75 with 46 seconds left. USU then got a defensive stop with 21 seconds left and had one final chance to tie it up. Miller passed up a contested corner three and found Ashworth, who put up a good shot from the wing but didn’t get it to fall. A Boise State rebound and made free-throws by Kigab put the game on ice.
“I was going to shoot that corner one but Alston flew at me,” said Miller. “I mean we still had time so I wanted to make sure we got a good look and I didn’t want to jack up something that was a low percentage shot…I swung the ball to try and get something cleaner and Steven (Ashworth) had a great look, but didn’t make it.”
By losing two chances at quad-one victories and dropping their third and fourth conference games, the Aggies’ chances of earning a spot as an at-large team in the NCAA tournament are slim to none. They will regroup for their final homestand of the season next week against the Nevada Wolfpack.