Despite missing 18 straight field goals in the first half and facing a nine point deficit early in the second half — the largest faced by USU this season — the Aggies hung on to beat St. Bonaventure 72-67 in the opening round of the NIT Season Tip-off in Orlando on Thanksgiving.
Utah State’s offensive numbers entering this week were what jumped off the page for most people. A 98.6 points per game average (first in the nation) and top ten ranks in most shooting percentage categories were about as impressive as it gets. But the question for teams with those kinds of numbers always tends to be what happens when the shots aren’t falling.
For Utah State, the answer is just to win anyway. The Aggies have won back-to-back games in uglier fashion with this Thanksgiving win alongside the victory over Iowa earlier this week.
“Really what you got look at is, around the country, who’s winning like that,” USU head coach Jerrod Calhoun asked. “In this NIL and this [transfer] portal world, who wins ugly like that, with so many new players? Not a lot. And I think that’s what makes Utah State a different place.”
The defining stretch of the Aggies’ “ugly” performance Thursday was the 0-for-18 cold spell that began with 16:32 left in the first half and lasted until the 8:02 mark when Aubin Gateretse opened the bucket with a two-handed dunk.
A host of USU players contributed to the early slump. The one who felt it the worst was Ian Martinez, who’s status in this game was up in the air due to waking up Thursday morning with food poisoning. Martinez went 2-of-10 from the field, a drastic departure from the 50 percent shooting he’s enjoyed so far this season. But he obviously wasn’t the only one. Karson Templin was 1-of-6, Deyton Albury 0-of-3 and Drake Allen went 3-of-8.
“Credit the Bonnie’s,” Calhoun said. “Best defensive team we’ve played this year, not even close. They swarmed the ball. They helped from the corners. They make it ugly, and they’re not gonna give up.”
But while that cold spell defined the first half, the game wound up being partly defined by a stunning fact about all those misses: Utah State still held the lead even as the 18th straight missed shot clanged off the rim, a 13-12 advantage.
The Aggies did end up allowing the Bonnies to take a notable advantage late in the half and early in the second half, but keeping the game close while playing their worst (at least on one side of the ball) was perhaps the most underrated part of the game.
“It wasn’t the kind of game that we were hoping for,” said USU wing Dexter Akanno. “But it’s something that we kind of knew coming up, that it was going to be a tough and gritty game. And due to coach’s game plan and everybody’s execution through our practices and throughout this game we were able to get it done.”
Winning would still require offense and Utah State would eventually get its very potent offense going. The Aggies shifted from shooting 23.7 percent in the first half to an even 50 percent in the second. With so many players having off nights, the big shots fell largely (but not entirely) to the likes of Mason Falslev and Akanno.
Akanno’s biggest moment was a pair of shots that kicked off the run that flipped the game. The Bonnies led 41-33 but back-to-back threes by Akanno — both within 30 seconds of each other — rocketed the Aggies to within two points.
Thankful for Dexter’s deep range 🙏#AggiesAllTheWay pic.twitter.com/9DW5ILxUcM
— USU Men’s Hoops (@USUBasketball) November 28, 2024
Allen tied the game shortly after with a pair of free throws. St. Bonaventure hit a shot to take the lead back, but Mason Falslev made his mark with a clutch late-in-the-shot-clock jumper to tie it back up.
Mason COOKED ‘EM at the buzzer 🧑🍳@mason_falslev #AggiesAllTheWay pic.twitter.com/6dVHnSbzQs
— USU Men’s Hoops (@USUBasketball) November 28, 2024
Following that, runs of 5-0 and 6-0 by the Aggies handed them a 52-44 lead. In all, it was a 19-3 run from Utah State, beginning with those Akanno 3-pointers. He wound up finishing with 14 points, including a team-best three made 3-pointers. Martinez, despite his illness, had 14 points (mostly on the back of going 9 for 10 on free throws). They were joined in double figures by Allen (12), Gateretse (10) and Falslev’s team-leading 15. Along with those 15 points, Falslev had 12 rebounds to record his second straight double-double.
From there, Utah State controlled the game, but faced a brief scare near the end of the game. A 13-point lead with 2:39 left in the game was whittled to as low as three points with 25 seconds to play. A combination of turnovers, a few missed free throws and St. Bonaventure making multiple long, desperate 3-pointers led to some tense moments.
“We just have to focus on finishing out games,” Akanno said. “We just have to have more of an attention to detail and focus going into those later times of the game.”
The win pushes Utah State to 6-0, the best start for the program since 2022 (started 9-0) and makes Calhoun just the second USU head coach to begin his tenure with at least a 6-0 start (LaDell Anderson in 1962 who began 8-0). The Aggies will move on to face North Texas who defeated Northern Iowa 68-48 at the NIT Season Tipoff in Florida. The game tips off at 4:30 Mountain Time on ESPN2.
