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RENO, Nev – Youth played experience on a snowy Saturday night in the Sierras.
Youth prevailed.
Youth dominated.
San Diego State took one of college basketball’s least experienced rosters to the Lawlor Events Center, where some of its most veteran teams have struggled. And won 69-50 – won convincingly – against a Nevada team that ranks seventh in Division I in experience at an average of 3.1 years per player.
The Wolf Pack’s starting lineup: fourth-year junior, fifth-year senior, fifth-year senior, fifth-year senior and sixth-year senior. The first guy off the bench is a fifth-year senior, too.
SDSU: A freshman and two sophomores start, and three more underclassmen are part of the regular rotation.
Maybe ignorance is bliss, though, not knowing, not living the horror stories from previous visits to Lawlor.
These Aztecs (13-5, 6-3) did what the last two teams could not, and in the process righted a listing ship that was rapidly taking on water. You can make a strong argument that their three worst performances of the season came in the previous four games – a blowout loss at New Mexico, a home loss against a UNLV team that promptly dropped its next two, and a buzzer-beating overtime escape on Wednesday that kept Air Force winless in the Mountain West (and would have been statistically the program’s worst loss in the 29-year history that the Kenpom metric has kept records).
It also rejuvenated their fading NCAA Tournament hopes. Just weeks after having the Aztecs firmly in his projected bracket, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi on Friday dropped SDSU to his final four teams in with several upwardly mobile teams breathing down their necks.
The Aztecs did it on a night when leading scorers Miles Byrd and Nick Boyd combined for two points on 2 of 11 shooting in the first half. And on a night when they struggled, again, to keep its opponent off the offensive boards. And on a night where, for the third straight game, they couldn’t stop fouling.
But they found production elsewhere, mostly notably a double-double from 7-foot redshirt freshman Magoon Gwath (15 points on 7 of 7 shooting to go with 13 rebounds).
Another freshman, Taj DeGourville, had 14. Everyone else in the 10-man rotation scored, a little here, a little there.
The real savior, however, was at the other end: Defense.
Aztecs defense.
Vintage Aztecs defense.
Nevada (11-9, 3-6) managed just 21 points in the first half and didn’t break 30 until inside nine minutes to go … in the game. With seven minutes left, the Wolf Pack was 10 of 40 overall, 3 of 20 behind the arc and trailed by 21.
The Aztecs had their best start of the season, winning the opening tip and finding BJ Davis for a 3 from the left corner, then getting a baseline spin followed by a reverse layup by Jared Coleman-Jones for a quick 5-0 lead.
They wouldn’t score again for 7½ minutes, a mess of six missed shots and four turnovers.
The Wolf Pack made them pay with a 13-2 run, only for the Aztecs to respond with a 13-0 run on 3-pointers by three different players.
By halftime, the SDSU lead was 28-21 despite having three more turnovers and shooting five fewer free throws and off nights from their top two leading scorers.
The question then became whether they could sustain that in the second half.
The answer: They could, and then some.
Notable
The team planned to use one of its charter legs to fly home immediately after the game, with another game coming Tuesday at home against San Jose State (allowing them two full days of practice).
• The Aztecs now are home for nearly two weeks, with a pair of games at Viejas Arena followed by a midweek bye. The next road game isn’t until Feb. 8 at Colorado State.
• Pharaoh Compton’s sister was in attendance, sitting just across the visitor’s tunnel from the Nevada student section. The two sides exchanged in increasingly animated banter through the first half.
Originally Published:
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