LOGAN — While the Utah State Aggies are headed to the city widely considered to have the best year-round weather in the country, a No. 9 seed in the NCAA Tournament left some dark clouds lingering above an otherwise joyous occasion for the team Sunday afternoon.
The Mountain West Conference regular-season and postseason tournament champion Aggies (28-6) were given a 9 seed and a first-round matchup with No. 8 seed Villanova (24-8) Friday in San Diego, California, by the NCAA Tournament selection committee.
Obviously very familiar with Viejas Arena from playing Mountain West rival San Diego State, the Aggies will tip it off against the Wildcats at 2:10 p.m. MT.
“I haven’t seen them at all this season,” USU head coach Jerrod Calhoun said of Villanova, “but I’m really happy with the location for our fans and our players. Obviously, San Diego is close.”
Then the coach shared his thoughts on the seed his team received.
“But,” Calhoun added, “I think the seed was absolutely atrocious.”
Following Saturday’s 73-62 win over San Diego State in the Mountain West championship game at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, Calhoun expressed hope that the Aggies might even slotted a No. 6 seed.
But while some bracketologists suggested that Utah State had moved up from a No. 8 seed to a No. 7 after winning the conference tournament, that ended up being far from the case.
“The one thing we don’t have is the whatever they’re calling it, a Quad A1 win,” Calhoun acknowledged, referring to a win over an elite team in the country.
“But we’ve got great metrics on both sides of the ball. We’re Top 30 in offense, Top 50 in defense, so I thought for sure a 6 or 7 seed. I was really hoping for one of those, but I think we got to look at it like, ‘Hey, we’re in the West.’ That’s a huge positive for us and our fans, but I just don’t think it was very deserving. I thought we should have been at least a 7.”
Prior to Sunday’s bracket announcement, Utah State was No. 26 in the NET, had an overall strength of schedule of 87, 13 wins away from home (a 7-5 road record and a 6-0 mark on neutral courts) and a 4-4 record against Quad 1 teams.
Utah State also boasted a 9-1 record against Quad 2 opponents, a 9-1 record against Quad 3 opponents and a 5-0 record against Quad 4 teams.
“I was hoping to get to a 6 or 7 seed, but, of course, it didn’t go that way,” USU senior guard MJ Collins Jr. said. “But 8-9 … we’re in the tournament.
“We still have a chance to make something happen, and who wouldn’t want the top dogs after we take down Villanova? That’s what it’s about.”
The “top dogs” Collins referred to would be another version of Wildcats. The winner of Friday’s game between Villanova and Utah State will on Sunday face the winner of the clash between No. 1 seed Arizona (32-2) and No. 16 seed Long Island (24-10).
That game will begin at 11:35 a.m. MT at Viejas Arena.
Villanova finished third in the Big East standings, going 15-5 under first-year head coach Kevin Willard, who previously coached at Maryland (2022-25), Seton Hall (2010-22) and Iona (2007-10).
The Wildcats are led by the quartet of junior guard Tyler Perkins (13.7 ppg, 5.4 rpg), senior forward Duke Brennan (12.4 ppg, 10.3 rpg), freshman guard Acaden Lewis (12.3 ppg) and sophomore guard Bryce Lindsay (11.9 ppg).
Villanova, which lost to Georgetown 74-68 in the quarterfinals of the Big East Tournament on March 12, doesn’t share any common opponents with the Aggies this season, though Villanova did lose to BYU 71-66 on Nov. 3 at the Hall of Fame Series in Las Vegas.
The Aggies, who will be going to the NCAA Tournament for a school-record fourth straight season, held an NCAA Tournament Selection Show watch party for themselves and their fans at the Spectrum Sunday.
In recent years, Utah State has hosted much more intimate gatherings at the West Stadium Center at Maverik Stadium, but the team, which arrived back in Cache Valley just before 1 p.m. Sunday, quickly reconvened back at the Spectrum, watching CBS’s annual broadcast on the big screen on the scoreboard, which had been lowered to just a few feet above Stew Morrill Court.
“I felt like last year wasn’t … well, I just didn’t like it,” said Calhoun, who is nearing the completion of his second season as the head coach of the Aggies. “It was over in the football stadium. It was just our team. We didn’t have a lot of parents. We didn’t have fans, and I don’t think that we can take these things for granted. NCAA Tournaments are hard to get to. There’s a lot of good teams that got left home.
“… We need our guys to remember this as long as they live, right? These are some of the greatest memories they’ll have. Their parents, our children; we want everybody to soak this in. We’re all tired. We get it, but at the end of the day, you’re on CBS, and they’re going live in our arena. That’s a pretty awesome deal, so we wanted to change things up a little bit.”
After traveling back from Las Vegas following playing three games in three days, Calhoun said he plans to keep his team off of the court on Monday, then hold a “good-spirited, hard-contact practice” Tuesday, followed by a lighter practice Wednesday morning before leaving for San Diego.
“These guys are really tired right now, so the best thing our group can do is get some rest,” Calhoun said. “But we’re really, really excited. … and we’re just getting started. Let’s not be happy to be there. Let’s go make a run. Let’s make history and take it one game at a time.”
Utah State’s last win in the NCAA Tournament came as a No. 8 seed in 2024 when it beat TCU 88-72 in Indianapolis under former head coach Danny Sprinkle.
Current Aggies Mason Falslev and Karson Templin were both on that USU team, while Drake Allen, Tucker Anderson, Jordy Barnes were also on the team during the 2024-25 season when Utah State’s season came to end with a 72-47 loss to UCLA in the first round at Rupp Arena in Lexington, Kentucky.
The Aggies also played a first-round NCAA Tournament game in San Diego in 2006 at what was then known as Cox Arena.
In that contest, Morrill and USU lost to Washington, 75-61, despite 21 points from guard Jaycee Carroll and 19 from forward Nate Harris.