While they might have been playing for a conference championship on Pi Day, the Utah State Aggies didn’t concern themselves with any complicated mathematics formulas Saturday afternoon in Las Vegas.
They just knew that two trophies were better than one, as they beat the San Diego State Aztecs 73-62 at the Thomas & Mack Center to claim the Mountain West Conference tournament crown after winning the regular season title.
“The last three days we’ve just guarded our tail off,” Utah State head coach Jerrod Calhoun said. “I’m really proud of the guys. To win the regular season (outright) and a tournament title, we just made Utah State history. It’s never been done, so I’m just really, really proud of our guys.”
While there was perhaps a 3.14% chance the Aggies (28-6) wouldn’t hear their name called during Sunday afternoon’s NCAA Tournament Selection Show regardless of the outcome of Saturday’s game against the Aztecs (22-11), they made that positive outcome a 100% certainty while potentially also knocking their longtime rivals out of the field of 68.
Utah State, which will make its fourth straight appearance in the NCAA Tournament next week, also became the seventh team in school history to win 28 or more games in a season.
“I hear all these coaches talking about their team,” Calhoun said. “We just won the regular season and the tournament. We’ve got 28 wins with great metrics on both sides. Now we’ll see if we get rewarded. I’ll be anxious to see what kind of seed, what kind of matchup, but our guys will be ready.
“Momentum is a powerful thing, and we’ve got great momentum right now.”
Senior guard MJ Collins Jr. led the way offensively for Utah State Saturday, totaling 20 points — including four 3-pointers — in 37 minutes on his way to being named MVP of the Aggies’ final Mountain West tournament.
“He’s the MVP for a reason,” USU graduate guard Drake Allen said of Collins. “That’s what he does. Whenever we needed a big shot down the stretch, he was ready to take them.
“We’re very confident putting the ball in his hands. We know he’s going to make big shots; he’s been doing it all year.”
Utah State also got 16 points, six assists and four rebounds from 2026 Mountain West Player of the Year Mason Falslev, 13 points, six rebounds and three assists from Allen and 11 points and six rebounds off the bench from senior forward Garry Clark.
For their play, Allen and Falslev joined Collins on the MW All-Tournament Team.
The Aggies shot 46.2% from the field as a team despite connecting on just 6 of 21 3-point field goal attempts, but Utah State outscored SDSU 46-22 in the paint and only committed six turnovers, while the Aztecs racked up 14 miscues, which the Aggies converted into 17 points.
“That’s our defense,” Collins said. “We know we’ve got to get out in transition and get easy buckets, so when we we’re able to turn teams over, it makes everything much better.
“We get going, and it’s like the defensive energy gets contagious because we’re just flying around and playing green. When we can turn a team over and also take care of the ball, I think we’re unbeatable.”
The top-seeded Aggies, who clinched the outright Mountain West regular-season title with a 94-90 win over New Mexico a week ago at the Spectrum, played greedy basketball in Las Vegas, roughing up No. 8 UNLV by 20 on Thursday and eliminating No. 5 Nevada by 13 Friday in the semifinals before taking out No. 2 San Diego State.
Four of USU’s five regular-season conference losses came against those programs, and yet the Aggies became the first team in the history of the Mountain West tournament to win in the quarterfinals, semifinals and the final by double-digits in the same year.
“We knew this was a revenge tour for us,” said Collins, who scored 20 points in the win over the Rebels and a dozen against the Wolf Pack. “Everybody we played, they beat us, so we took that personal.
“And you know, I wouldn’t have been able to do it without God, my family, my girl, Coach (Calhoun), the whole coaching staff and the whole community of Logan. They were behind our backs, and we came out here and played for them.”
Calhoun seconded Collins’ declaration that the Aggies came to Sin City earlier this week seeking revenge, as well as getting back to firing on all cylinders after losing three out of four games in late February and early March to the three teams they faced in the tournament.
After beating San Diego State 71-66 in Logan on Jan. 31, the Aggies were crushed by the Aztecs, 89-72, at Viejas Arena on Feb. 25.
“I’m extremely, extremely proud of the toughness level that this group of guys came to Vegas with,” Calhoun said. “We were not going to be bullied. We were going to be the bully.
“I kind of deemed this our redemption tour. UNLV beat us twice, Nevada beat us at Nevada and we obviously got embarrassed a couple weeks ago by the Aztecs. We were coming in here to be the bully, we were coming in here for a redemption tour, and it certainly was accomplished.”
Coached by Craig Smith, the 2018-19 Utah State team shared the regular season title with Nevada, then went on to win the Mountain West tourney behind an MVP performance from current Cleveland Cavaliers guard Sam Merrill. The Aggies beat San Diego State in the championship game that year, as well as in the title contest at the end of the 2019-20 season, just prior to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Aztecs avenged those defeats with victories in the MW title game in 2021 and ’23, but the 2025-26 version of the Aggies broke that 2-2 tie just prior to both teams leaving the Mountain West for the new-look Pac-12 Conference.
“First of all, congratulations to coach Calhoun, Utah State and their coaching staff,” said SDSU Brian Dutcher, who made his eighth appearance in the MW championship in the past nine seasons Saturday afternoon.
“Regular season champs and postseason champs, that’s hard to do, but they did it, and they did it with great efficiency. We knew the whole game was going to be decided in the paint, and they got in the paint more than we did. They lived in the paint, made plays from the paint and then made timely jump shots.”
San Diego State, which advanced to the championship game with a hard-fought 64-62 win over New Mexico late Friday night/early Saturday morning, got 20 points from senior guard Reese Dixon-Waters and 12 points and eight rebounds from sophomore forward Magoon Gwath.
Both of those Aztecs were also named to the all-tourney team, while junior guard BJ Davis also contributed 14 points in the loss to Utah State.
Overall, San Diego State shot 40.8% from the floor Saturday, went 5 for 16 from 3-point range and finished 17 for 24 from the free-throw line.
Already short on sleep due to the tournament schedule, the Aztecs also played without the services of Miles Heide. Dutcher said the junior forward, who was averaging 5.6 points, 4.5 rebounds and 19 minutes per game, likely broke his left (shooting) hand during Friday’s game against the Lobos.
“I mean, you don’t want to blame fatigue, but I think we got back to our hotel at 12:30 last night. Three games in a row,” SDSU junior guard Myles Byrd said. “Obviously, they just looked like the more fresh team in the second half.
“When it came to winning time, they made more plays, got to the paint, dropped off to the big, dunks, layups, offensive rebounds. They just made more winning plays than we did.”
Arguably the biggest play of the game came with five minutes left with the Aggies holding onto a 58-54 advantage.
Collins, who had already knocked down a 3-pointer just 30 seconds earlier, buried another trey from the left corner for what appeared to be a 61-54 lead.
However, just as Collins was setting up to release his shot, Dixon-Watters flattened USU forward Zach Keller while trying to get to the Aggies’ leading scorer and was called for his fourth foul.
But before Keller could take aim at a potential five-point play, the Aggies had to sweat out a lengthy review by the officials to decide whether or not the foul came before or after Collins’ shot.
The call eventually went USU’s way, and Keller connected on both free-throw attempts to suddenly put the Aggies ahead by nine points.
“Yeah, it made me feel good,” Collins said of his pair of timely 3-pointers. “I got to chirping a little bit, but just credit to coach; he always tells me to make the right read. As I’m coming off the pin-downs and I’m taking a rear-view peek at Reese Dixon to see how he’s guarding me, I curled one of them, and I hit the 3.
“And the second one he tried to shoot the gap, and I bumped it. A great screen by Zach, great pass by Mason, and the shot goes down. It’s a big swing because it was a five-point swing right there — Zach goes to the line, and he hits two free throws, so it was huge.”
The Aztecs, who would fall behind 65-54 on an easy bucket by Adlan Elamin moments later, were unable to get any closer than eight points the remainder of the game.
“Obviously, the critical play of the game was the five-point play in a four-point game,” Dutcher said. “That was really a huge momentum turner; took the lead from four to nine in one possession. Then they just kind of held on to it from that point on.
“But it was a hard-fought game, and its basketball. We’re disappointed. We wanted to win in the worst way and put ourselves in a position to do that, and then obviously Utah State did a great job defensively and really limited our opportunities at the offensive end.”
The Aggies led by as many as six points in the first half, but the game was tied on six occasions, and a woeful offensive stretch by Utah State just before halftime helped San Diego State take a one-point lead into halftime.
While SDSU scored the final five points of the first half, Utah State missed nine of its final 10 shot attempts and the Aztecs enjoyed a 35-34 advantage as they headed to their locker room.
But that optimism quickly disappeared when Allen put together a 7-0 run all by himself coming out of intermission. The former Westlake High star got Utah State the lead back on a driving layup just 10 seconds into the second half, and then quickly added a 3-pointer and another layup in transitions thanks to a steal by Collins.
Suddenly down 41-35, Dutcher called for a timeout with 18:22 left, which led to a quick, 10-2 run by the Aztecs to go back up by two points.
But the Aggies countered with two free throws by Allen to tie the game for the final time at 45-45, and a high-flying dunk by Collins on SDSU forward Pharoah Compton moments later got the lead back for the Aggies for good.
“It means the world,” Collins responded when asked about being named tournament MVP. “But it also shows how good our team is. Mason got Mountain West Player of the Year, and then I can come and get the MVP.
“… This is a team accolade. I wouldn’t be able to do it without them, so I’m thankful for them and coach Calhoun, of course. Like I’ve continued to say, the fans travel for us. On their spring break, they gave their time up to come and support us, so it means the world.”
For the third straight game, the contingent of Aggie fans at the Thomas & Mack Center dwarfed that of their opponent, particularly when comparing the student sections.
Partly as a reward for that support, Utah State announced on Saturday that it will host a Selection Show watch party at 4 p.m. Sunday for the team and the media as well as the public. Doors to the Spectrum will open at 3:30 p.m.
“Tomorrow is going to be an unbelievable day for our fans,” Calhoun said. “We should pack the Spectrum. … Tomorrow is just a celebration.
“It’s a celebration, but it’s also go time. We need a day off, maybe two. I’ve got to call some coaches, get a good game plan on that, but we need a good seed.”
Calhoun later added, “We’re going to get back to Logan. We’re going to take tomorrow off physically, but it starts again tomorrow night.
“We’ll be drinking more coffees, and we’ll be in Estes (Center). You don’t sleep as a coach. How could you? This is the greatest time in the world for college basketball coaches and players and fans. Buckle up; the next three weeks could be really good.”