Utah State head coach Danny Sprinkle mentioned several times in the leadup to Saturday’s game between the Aggies and Bradley Braves that his team would need to find a way to respond to adversity when they faced it. Two games against Division II opponents, one exhibition and one the season/home opener, hadn’t truly tested this Aggie team.
On Saturday, Bradley brought plenty of adversity to this game, and while the Aggies met most of it with good responses, victory fell just outside of their grasp. The Braves downed Utah State 72-66 in overtime.
For all 40 minutes of regulation, the Aggies met every test Bradley threw at them, even overcoming some self-inflicted issues on offense. At halftime, USU even led 30-28, its defense holding Bradley well in check on defense and got 14 points from Great Osobor in the first half alone.
Osobor finished the game with 22 points, five rebounds, three assists and four blocks, a massive presence all night with plenty of timely buckets and/or fouls drawn. He showed his potential to be the leader of this team full of newcomers.
For as good as Osobor was, the Aggies struggled mightily to get baskets all night, shooting just 33.8 percent overall and 25.8 percent on 3-pointers. In overtime, Utah State didn’t make a single field goal, going 0-for-6. All four of its points in the extra period came on a pair of trips to the free-throw line.
That poor offense squandered an overall great defensive performance. USU held the Braves scoreless for several long stretches, but the Aggies were usually also held scoreless in these same spans. The most notable was the start of the first half where the Aggies had a chance to capitalize on its 6-0 run at the end of the first half that gave them the two-point lead at the break. Bradley scored just two points in the first four minutes of the second half. Unfortunately, the Aggies also scored just two points in the first four minutes of the second half.
Bradley made the first big move by either team, putting together a 12-2 run starting at the 15:36 mark of the second half. In such a low-scoring game, that scoring burst created a massive shift in the tone of the game. Utah State had to play from behind for most of the second half.
The Aggies never put together their own run to match that of Bradley, instead playing the long game, gradually working their way back with shorter runs of 4-0 here and 6-0 there. With 5:06 left in the game, USU finally pulled ahead again thanks to big shots from Darius Brown and Max Agbonkpolo, who’s 3-pointer gave the Aggies a 56-54 lead.
For the final five minutes of the game, both sides traded massive blows. Bradley guard Connor Hickman, 21 points himself on the night, nailed a 3-pointer to give the Braves a 59-56 lead but Darius Brown matched it exactly a minute later with his own triple to tie it up. Darius Hannah threw down a two-handed dunk that put Bradley back up by two but Isaac Johnson came back with an and-one layup that gave USU a 61-60 lead with 67 seconds left on the clock.
With just over a minute to play, the Aggies needed a defensive stop or a score to respond on the other end. They got neither. Bradley tied the game with a Duke Deen free throw and Osobor missed a layup on the other end. Luckily for the Aggies, the Braves couldn’t hit a game-winning shot at the buzzer as Hickman’s triple clanged off the rim.
In overtime, the 0-for-6 shooting simply doomed the Aggies to a slow death. They took a 64-63 lead less than a minute into the extra period, but Bradley leapfrogged Utah State a couple minutes later with another Hannah dunk and later a layup from Hickman with 50 seconds left to put the Braves up 67-64.
The final chance Utah State had came with under 30 seconds left in the game. Two free throws from Osobor brought the game to a 67-66 differential and Bradley had the ball. The shot clock read 21, game clock 28. Enough time for a stop and a game-winning or go-ahead shot. The Aggies went into an aggressive half-court zone as the Braves whipped the ball around between all four corners of their half of the court. With the shot clock winding down, Christian Davis attempted a corner three which he drilled to put Bradley up by four points with 10 seconds left. And when Brown’s desperation three missed, it effectively ended the game just shy of the official end of the game.
It’s a game that will go down as a tough break for the Aggies, but not one in which they did not perform well at times against a good team. Bradley are expected to finish toward the top of the Missouri Valley Conference and return four starters from a team that won 25 games last year. Several Utah State players distinguished themselves as capable of making plays in big situations. Johnson hit a pair of big threes as part of USU’s rally after giving up the 12-2 run, ending the game as one of Aggies in double figures with 11 points and seven rebounds. Brown hit multiple key shots and came within spitting distance of a triple-double with 13 points, eight rebounds and eight assists.
Of big help to the Aggies were two players that made their season debut — Ian Martinez, who was granted a waiver of eligibility just prior to the game, and Max Agbonkpolo who was questionable with a lingering foot injury.
