Huskies send Aggies home early
The NCAA Tournament eagerly received Utah State after an eight-year absence, but the Aggies didn’t fully come ready to play, falling to Washington 78-61 in the team’s first March Madness appearance since 2011.
Utah State enjoyed smooth sailing for the first few minutes, jumping out to an 11-5 lead. Four turnovers and a missed shot later, the Huskies were ahead 14-11 thanks to a 9-0 run. The Aggies briefly retook the lead, going up 17-14 but UW shot immediately back with another run, this time 13-4.
After taking the lead with 8:42 left in the first, Washington never trailed again.
“I thought we were really tentative in the first half,” USU head coach Craig Smith said. “And that was a lot to do with (Washington). They really disrupted us.”
Those last eight minutes and 42 seconds turned what had been a close game into a near route by the Huskies. Utah State committed four turnovers in that span and wound up being outscored 22-11 to close the half for a 40-28 lead at the break.
Jaylen Nowell, the Pac-12 Player of the Year and leading scorer on the season for UW, chipped in 11 of his 19 points in the first half, going 3-of-5 shooting-wise with three assists.
“We were really having a difficult time staying in front of them in the first half, especially (Nowell) who is obviously a very good player,” Smith said. “He was getting downhill, downhill, downhill. And they were just living at the rim which opens up offensive rebounding lanes.”
Noah Dickerson was the man who took advantage of those early offensive rebounding opportunities. He had three boards on that end in the first half and capitalized by scoring 14 of his game-leading 20 points in the first half.
“When he’s on,” Washington head coach Mike Hopkins said of Dickerson, “he’s one of the best big guys if no the best back-to-the-basket big guys in the country.”
The offensive hero for USU all year long, Sam Merrill, put up a very conspicuous zero points in the first half and just 10 the whole game. Merrill, who averaged 21.2 points this season as the Mountain West Player of the Year, went 0-for-3 from the field with two turnovers and two fouls to start the game.
“Their zone was really good tonight and they made it really tough on us,” Merrill said. “We had practiced against it all week, but like I said pregame, you can’t replicate the length they have and the athleticism they have. And they did a very good job not just taking away my looks, but making things tough for us as a team as well.”
Matt Halton USU guard Sam Merrill is double-teamed by Washington in Utah State’s 78-61 loss to the Huskies on Friday. – Photo by Matt Halton
The length and zone led to a bevy of turnovers from the Aggies — 21 in all for the game. Smith said the turnovers were “very uncharacteristic of” Utah State. Only two other times in 35 total games did USU commit 20-plus turnovers: their 72-49 loss to Nevada (20) and 91-83 win over New Mexico in the Mountain West tournament (23).
Those giveaways led to 26 points for Washington. They also negated a solid shooting performance in the first half by Utah State (45.8 percent overall and 40 percent from three) and compounded the team’s poor shooting in the second half 26.7 and 30.8).
In place of Merrill, freshman guard/forward Brock Miller stepped up on offense. The 6-foot-6 Utah native scored a team-high 13 points, shooting 3-of-6 from deep. Before Friday, Miller had scored in double figures just twice in his last 13 games.
Matt Halton Brock Miller rises and fires a shot in Utah State’s 78-61 loss to Washington on Friday. – Photo by Matt Halton
Utah State made a heroic push despite being down 40-28 at the break. The Aggies cut that 12-point lead down to just one point with a 14-3 run midway through the second half. Merrill drained a corner trey (just his second made shot of the game) to cap what was almost a game-changing run. But, once again, Washington countered.
Nahziah Carter nailed back-to-back 3-pointers to push UW back up seven points. That kick-started an 11-2 run and the Aggies never got closer than seven from that point on. Smith said that, after Merrill’s three that cut the lead to one, “we just almost got maybe a little overzealous with our press and took some chances we really didn’t need to,” opening the door for Washington to make its counter-run.
Those two triples, though, were part of a blistering shooting effort from the Huskies for the entire second half. In the latter 20 minutes, Washington missed just one time from beyond the arc (6-of-7). For a team that shot 34.6 percent from deep on the year, the 58.8 percent on Friday was a commendable effort.
“To their credit they made some threes on us,” Smith said of Washington, “and some of those were tough threes. Some were wide open. But good teams make plays, good players make plays. We’ve done it all year. And to their credit, they just made a few more plays than us.”
Quinn Taylor takes a jump shot against Washington. Taylor is fifth all-time at Utah State in games played. – Photo by Matt Halton
The loss concludes the season for the Aggies, who finish with a 28-7 record, the programs best mark since the 30-4 team from 2010-11 (the last USU squad to make the Tournament). Two seniors on the team, Quinn Taylor and Dwayne Brown Jr., will graduate and leave what Smith called an “amazing group to be around.”
“I have never seen a team come together like this team has,” Smith said. “I just wish every coach could coach a team like this.”
Taylor ends his Aggie career fifth on the all-time list of games played in the fighting white. He appeared in 130 games in his four years, playing 2,666 minutes while recording 791 points with 607 rebounds and 176 assists. Brown Jr., in two seasons with Utah State, played in 69 games, scoring 521 points, reeled in 256 rebounds and dished out 68 assists.