Utah St. flies past Illinois State at home
Utah State’s men’s basketball team picked up an 89-84 win against Illinois State with an impressive offensive performance Saturday at home, but Aggie Head Coach Stew Morrill was less than thrilled with the defensive effort his team gave.
“The only redeeming quality was we get to put a win on the board,” Morrill said sarcastically. “Utah State basketball has changed. We just want to have shootouts now. We don’t want to guard anybody. We just want to see if we can outscore them, that’s our new deal.”
Utah State’s offense clicked at times, but the Aggies came out flat in the first half and struggled defending throughout the game.
“We’re lucky we won tonight,” Morrill said. “We had some guys play great offensively, in terms of stats, but I was really disappointed defensively.”
Where do the defensive problems start?
“Where do they end?” Morrill said. “We’re going to have to figure out how to guard somebody or it’s going to be tough times.”
The offensive onslaught was led by point guard Mark Brown’s career-highs in both points and assists. Brown, who finished with 20 points on 6-of-9 shooting and dished out 13 assists, was quick to credit his team.
“You can’t get 13 assists without your teammates making shots,” he said.
The team shot 66.7 percent on the game, including 79.2 percent in the second half, the second time this season the Aggies have shot better than 78 percent in a half.
Utah State, trailing 31-30 at the half, jumped on the Redbirds with a 15-5 run to start the second period.
Five Aggies scored in double figures in the game. Guard Cardell Butler came away with 14, all in the second half, while forward Jason Williams, getting his first start of the year, scored all of his career-high 11 points in the first half.
“We got the win from the offense,” Butler said. “We didn’t show them enough respect.”
Forwards Spencer Nelson and Nate Harris had 13 and 11 respectively. Two more Aggies who came close to double figures were center Mike Ahmad with nine and Chris Huber with eight.
Utah State led by as many as 13 but couldn’t put Illinois State completely away. Redbird Trey Guidry’s trey at the final buzzer brought Utah State’s final margin of victory down to five.
Morrill was not satisfied.
“You shoot 80 percent in the second half, you ought to win by more than five,” he said.
Illinois State kept the game from becoming a blowout by shooting 58.5 percent for the game. The Redbirds also had five players score in double figures, led by forward Neil Plank’s 21-point effort.
Guidry came off the bench to hit 4-of-7 from behind the arc, tossing in 18 points. Forward Marcus Arnold had 14, and guard Vince Greene and forward Chris Burras chipped in 12 points apiece coming off the bench.
Utah State fell behind by as many as 11 points in the first half, but Williams’ 11, including seven consecutive points for the Aggies, brought the team back to within one at the break.
Morrill said the team was scheduled to have a day of rest on Sunday, but the lack of defense made him decide to hold practice to prepare for the upcoming game against No. 23 Utah in Salt Lake Wednesday night.
“We wouldn’t have won tonight if we weren’t at home,” he said. “There’s no way.”
The Aggies take on the Utes at 7:05 p.m. The game will be televised on KJZZ.
-royburton@cc.usu.edu