 |
| Utah St Celebrating Their Mountain West Conference Championship Photo Courtesy of Utah State Twitter |
The Mountain West Conference held its annual basketball tournament in Las Vegas, Nevada last week.
San Diego St. went into the tournament as the favorites to win it all. They finished the regular season with a record of 28-1, reaching as high as the 4th spot in the national rankings. Their sole loss of the season came from their game in San Diego against UNLV.
Utah State, UNLV, UNR (Reno), and Boise St. got first round byes along with SDSU. Even though UNLV and BSU got byes, they were matched up against each other in the Quarterfinals on day two of the tournament.
This was a very significant matchup because these teams had just played each other a week prior. UNLV led that game from wire to wire, at one point extending their lead to 27 points. BSU was looking to get some revenge after what seemed like a very abysmal effort on their part.
The first round of the tournament saw matchups between Air Force Academy vs Fresno State, San Jose State vs New Mexico, and Wyoming vs Colorado State.
Wyoming was the biggest shock of the tournament. They finished the regular season with a conference record of 2-16, last in the conference. In the first round, they were able to get the upset over the sixth seed, Colorado State.
Riding the high of the first round win, Wyoming went into their Quarterfinals matchup against UNR with a lot of confidence. Wyoming was able to get their second win of the tournament after beating the third seed, thus matching their conference wins from the regular season. Their miracle run would be short-lived, however, after they fell to Utah St in the Semifinals.
The first game of the Quarterfinals featured the San Diego St Aztecs. It almost seemed as if the tournament was being held in San Diego. Their fan base travels so well. At one point in the game, the crowd was so loud that the media tables were shaking.
"The fan support is unreal...you could tell today that a ton of San
Diego fans made it out here...huge shout out to Aztec Nation."
- Yanni Wetzell, Aztecs Forward
The host team, UNLV, wasn't able to take advantage of the hometown crowd. In their Quarterfinal game against BSU, they shot very poorly from the free throw line (61.5%) and from the field overall (31.2%). The Rebels made a great effort to mount a comeback at the end of the game, but they came up short, 67-61.
In the Semifinals round, Mr. Mountain West, Sam Merrill, helped lead the Utah St. Aggies to a win over the near-Cinderella Story Wyoming Cowboys. Merrill has scored 20+ points in five consecutive MW Conference tournament games, dating back to last season. This was the second straight year the Aggies made it to the championship, having won the tournament last year following the 2018-2019 season.
The San Diego St. Aztecs took care of business in the other Semifinal matchup. They faced a Boise St game coming off their win against UNLV. This was a very competitive game in the first half. However, the Aztecs took over and completely dominated the second half, winning 81-68.
The conference final was set. With an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament on the line, it was San Diego St against Utah St. The #1 vs #2 seeds. The Aztecs maintained control of the game during the first half. However, the game flipped in the second half and saw Utah St take control. With only seconds remaining, the Aggies found themselves in a tie game. The ball was inbounded to Merrill, he dribbled for a couple of seconds, then put up a very contested shot...BUCKET!
Sam Merrill won the Mountain West Conference championship game for the Utah St Aggies, earning them a ticket to the big dance. They will be joining SDSU, who will be getting into the tournament based on the great regular season they had this year.
The NCAA Tournament starts play on Tuesday, March 17, with play-in games on Tuesday and Wednesday. Then the full fledged tournament will start on Thursday, March 19, with the first of six rounds kicking off.
No comments:
Post a Comment