LAS VEGAS — Survive, and advance.
San Diego State knows the drill.
The top-seeded Aztecs won their 16th consecutive quarterfinal in the Mountain West men’s basketball tournament Thursday, but if you’ve seen them, you know the scores sometimes aren’t as convincing as the streak suggests. A couple years ago, they nearly got beat by eighth-seeded Wyoming. A few years before that, they had to overcome a 21-point deficit – the largest in school history – to beat UNLV in overtime. A few years before that, a buzzer-beater against Boise State.
Add another to the list: a 64-61 nail-biter against an eighth-seeded Colorado State team that refused to give into the fatigue from playing the day before.
But the 20th-ranked Aztecs are in the semifinals Friday night against Nevada or San Jose State because their vaunted defense got crucial stops down the stretch and because Matt Bradley, who has a history of missing them, made a pair of free throws with 16.6 seconds left.
The first rattled around and in. The second was all net, giving the Aztecs a three-point led.
Coach Brian Dutcher called timeout to set his defense, which didn’t look set at all as Colorado State’s Isaiah Stevens went the length of the floor for an uncontested layup. The Rams fouled Nathan Mensah, who made one of two, forcing SDSU to sweat another attempt at late heroics by Stevens, who won the play-in game against Fresno State on a floater in the lane with 2.7 seconds left.
Colorado State coach Niko Medved doesn’t like to call timeout in that situation and just let his team go against the broken floor. Stevens got a decent fall-away look from 12 feet that missed. James Moors grabbed the rebound and tried to go back up, only for Mensah to block it.
More drama: Mensah was fouled and made one of two with 0.7 seconds left, meaning a desperation 3 could send it to overtime. And a full-court heave by Stevens hit the front rim.
Survive, and advance.
Lamont Butler led SDSU (24-6) with 16 points but on 5 of 14 shooting. Bradley had 13 after not taking a shot for the game’s opening 12 minutes. Jaedon LeDee had 10 points and eight rebounds (but five turnovers) in a dominant 19 minutes.
The Aztecs shot only 38.2 percent and were 5 of 19 behind the arc. But they outrebounded the Rams 42-32 and held them to 5 of 17 on 3s. Stevens (16), John Tonje (17), Patrick Cartier (12) and Jalen Lake (10) gave Colorado State four double-figure scorers, but the rest of the roster combined for six.
Bench scoring was 23-5 in favor of SDSU.
The Aztecs led 27-25 in a sloppy, ugly, disjointed first half, and both teams probably felt good about it.
SDSU, because it was 2 of 11 behind the arc, had seven turnovers in one seven-minute stretch and got only three points from Bradley. CSU, because it was shooting 35.7 percent, getting crushed on the boards (24-13) and Stevens had zero points on 0 of 6 shooting.
The Rams won the opening tip and raced to an 8-0 lead before the Aztecs realized they were playing in a single-elimination tournament and might want to, you know, start scoring.
Dutcher didn’t wait until the first media timeout to make subs, sending in three with the game barely three minutes old. That stabilized things, as the subs were responsible – either scoring or assisting – the next three baskets.
The Aztecs didn’t take their first lead until a three-point play by Butler with 3:27 left in the half and would have led by more had they not missed free throws. Or stopped turning it over.
But the Rams, who played a tough, emotional game 25 hours earlier, appeared to tire as the half wore on, evidenced by no turnovers for the opening 16 minutes and four in the final four. As the game remained close through the middle of the second half, the question became whether the wear on the tires would result in a crash.
It didn’t, and the Rams hung around until the bitter end. Neither team led by more than five over the final 37 minutes of the game. There were nine ties and 11 lead changes, the final coming on a pair of LeDee free throws with 1:20 left after a Stevens 3 had put the Rams up 59-58.
Notable
The lower bowl at Thomas & Mack Center was about two-thirds full for the first of four games Thursday … The under-16 media timeout didn’t come until 12:42 left in the first half. The teams played 52 seconds, then went to their benches for the under-12 timeout … The officiating crew: Nate Harris, Tommy Nunez and Deron White … Points in the paint were even at 30-30, but the Aztecs had a 17-10 advantage in second-chance scoring. They had 14 offensive boards to eight for CSU.
