Despite Tuesday night’s late start, the Utah State Aggies made sure no caffeine was necessary for their fans during their game against Colorado State.
Utah State energized and invigorated the Spectrum crowd of 9,130 by burying their first seven 3-point attempts and building a 23-point lead over the Rams in the first 10 minutes.
The Aggies then kept their fans in the arena and on the edge of their seats down the stretch by letting a 22-point second-half advantage dwindle down to as few as seven in the final minute.
Ultimately, despite another dismal free-throw shooting performance, Utah State managed to come away with a 93-85 victory.
“You know what? Tonight I’m going to take a really nice approach,” USU head coach Jerry Calhoun said after his team played with fire late in a game once again after building a big lead. “We’re 22-3. Let that sink in. We’re 22-3 with nine new players, so I’m going to very positive tonight.”
“But,” Calhoun added, “you have to give Colorado State a lot of credit. They just kept fighting back by making 3s, and it’s tough when you miss that many free throws. You put an extreme amount of pressure on your defense.”
The win helped second-place Utah State (22-3 overall, 12-2 in the Mountain West) pick up a half-game on first-place New Mexico (20-4, 12-1). The Lobos host Wyoming (11-13, 4-9) Wednesday night before welcoming the Aggies to The Pit Sunday afternoon.
“I think it’s a good time,” Calhoun said when asked about USU’s extra time in between games. “I’m going to fly to Phoenix bright and early tomorrow to see one of our recruits who has committed to us (Kingston Tosi).
“It’s tough getting out anymore. ... and we’ll give the guys the day off tomorrow, have very light shooting on Thursday and then do a two-day prep (for New Mexico).”
Sophomore guard Mason Falslev, who knocked down four 3-point attempts in the first half, led Utah State with 22 points on Tuesday, while senior forward Aubin Gateretse totaled 16 points and six rebounds while making all seven of his shots.
Graduate guard Ian Martinez, who missed nearly 18 minutes in the first half due to foul trouble, still managed to bury four 3-pointers and score 14 points.
Senior guards Dexter Akanno (11 points, three 3-pointers) and Deyton Albury (10 points) also scored in double figures for the Aggies, who shot 59.3% from the field, including a 12-for-23 effort from beyond the arc.
But the game, which started at 9 p.m. to accommodate a national television audience, didn’t get over until 11:20 p.m. thanks in a large part to Utah State going just 17 for 30 from the free-throw line.
“It’s something that keeps happening, and we have addressed it in practice,” Gateretse replied when asked about the Aggies’ tendency to not put teams away late.
“Our second halves have not been nearly as good as our first halves, and it is very frustrating. It’s like the same scenario where we’re missing free throws, and we can’t get stops. We’re going to address it again and keep working at getting better.”
Colorado State’s Nique Clifford went the other way, scoring most of his game-high 24 points late at the free-throw line. The graduate guard was just 6 for 15 from the field but notched three 3-pointers and knocked down all nine of his free-throw attempts.
The Rams, who also got 17 points from sophomore forward Jaylen Crocker-Johnson and 14 points from sophomore guard Kyan Evans, ended up shooting 45.5% from the floor as a team.
Colorado State went 13 for 33 from 3-point range and 22 for 27 from the free-throw line but committed 11 turnovers to USU’s six.
“We just dug ourselves such a hole, it was really impossible to come back,” CSU head coach Niko Medved said. “I thought in the final 10 minutes of the first half, we started to show some spunk and started to figure out a little bit of a better attack against the zone.
“Honestly, I thought for the last 30 minutes getting good shots was not a problem. We turned it over nine times in the first half and only twice in the second. I thought we did some good things but just defensively, we could never find a way to slow them down consistently.”
Utah State, which hadn’t played a home game since being crushed by New Mexico, 83-62 on Feb. 1, looked like a different team early in Tuesday’s clash with the Rams (15-9, 9-4).
Other than leading scorer Martinez picking up his second foul and going to the bench just over two minutes into the game, everything seemed to go right for the Aggies for most of the first half as they built leads of 8-0, 14-4, 27-7 and 34-12 before missing their first 3-pointer of the contest.
The Rams, who at one point had six shots and six turnovers, finally showed some life late in the first half and went into halftime trailing 45-30.
But Utah State countered with a strong start in the second half, and the Aggies pulled away for a 67-45 advantage with 12:20 left on an incredible play by Falslev.
The former Sky View High product managed to snare a long, hard rebound off a missed 3-pointer by Martinez, and then promptly fired off a low lob to Gateretse on the left side of the basket for the score.
“That was awesome because Mason didn’t even make eye contact with me, but I was ready,” Gateretse recalled. “You just have to be aggressive and make the right read, and that was awesome, man. It’s always great to play with guys like him who are so selfless.”
That play was the high point of the second half for the Aggies, who gave up 55 points to Colorado State after halftime. But Falslev managed to come down with a couple of key rebounds late in the contest, while Albury snagged a vital block at the other end of the court after missing two free throws.
“I thought Aubin was awesome; I’m really happy for him when he gets behind the defense, and I was really happy for Mason, just to see him smile again and see the ball go through the basket,” Calhoun said. “He had a phenomenal game, and I thought he was really good in a lot of areas, not just scoring.”