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USU hoops adds South Florida to non-conference slate

Slowly but surely the non-conference schedule for Utah State unfolds. The latest announcement came courtesy of the athletics department with the news that the Aggies will face South Florida in a Dec. 18 clash in the inaugural Battleground 2k event at the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas.

Four other teams will participate in the showcase — Baylor, Oregon State, Tennessee Martin and UTSA — but Utah State will not face any of them. Just the singular matchup against the USF.

The Bulls in 2018-19 went 24-14 overall but finished seventh in the AAC, closing the season with an 8-10 conference record after a 16-4 start prior to league play. They went on to compete in the postseason College Basketball Invitational (CBI), downing Stony Brook, Utah Valley and Loyola Marymount en route to facing DePaul in a three-game championship series. USF  beat their Big East opponent 2-1 in a closely contested series.

USF were an exceptionally young team last year with only one senior (of three on the roster) playing more than 50 minutes total on the season. As such, third-year head coach Brian Gregory will get back his entire end-of-season starting lineup and much of his remaining rotation. The one key loss being TJ Lang, a senior who averaged 5.7 points, 2.1 rebounds in 20.0 minutes per game in 35 appearances.

David Collins is the top returner in terms of points. As a sophomore last season, the 6-foot-3 guard averaged a team-high 15.9 points. He also led the team in free throw attempts per game (7.9) and free throws made (5.6). USF as a team ranked first in the NCAA in free throws attempted, getting to the charity stripe an average of 26.8 times per outing.

Senior point guard Laquincy Rideau and junior forward Alexis Yetna join Collins as returning players who averaged north of 10 points per game. Rideau averaged 13.4 to go with his team-leading 5.4 assists and 2.9 steals (an average that ranked sixth in the nation) and was one of 26 players last year to record a triple-double. Yetna led the team in rebounds per game at 9.6, complimenting his 12.3 points. Other contributors include junior forward Justin Brown (8.3 points) and sophomore 7-foot center Michael Durr (5.7 points, 6.2 rebounds, 1.2 blocks).

Gregory isn’t just running his old team back. The Bulls will benefit from now-eligible transfer Ezacuras Dawson III, a former four-star recruit and ESPN Top 100 athlete who spent his freshman year at Oklahoma State before entering the portal.

Utah State has faced the Bulls one time before, also in a neutral-site game during Stew Morrill’s third season as head coach in 2000-01. The Aggies beat USF 69-66 in Fairbanks, Alaska as part of the Top of the World Classic.

USU’s athletics department has yet to release the full non-conference schedule but are scheduled to play LSU (Nov. 22), North Texas (Nov. 24), BYU (Dec. 14), and Florida (Dec. 21). All of those games are neutral-site games. Utah State will also play Saint Mary’s in Moraga, California but a date for the games has not yet been set.

Mountain West play will begin for the Aggies on Dec. 4 on the road at San Jose State followed by a home matchup with Fresno State on Dec. 7. The games against BYU, USF and Florida will interrupt USU’s conference schedule until the new year when the Aggies travel to face UNLV on Jan. 1.