LAS VEGAS — Utah State’s defense has had its share of poor defensive outings late in the season. Friday’s semifinal victory over Nevada, in which the Aggies won by a convincing score of 79-66, will not be counted among those. And with the win, USU will advance to its first Mountain West Tournament championship game appearance since 2023.
Jerrod Calhoun’s squad made life miserable for the normally efficient Wolf Pack offense. Nevada shot just 41% from the field, its 11th-worst mark of the season, and had a season-worst 15 turnovers (tied with one other game). Combined with Thursday’s win over UNLV where the Aggies held the Rebels to 60 points, it’s been quite the resurgence for the a USU defense that allowed 84.0 points per game in the final five games of the regular season.
“It’s just attention to detail. It’s a long season, so at times you can get lackluster,” USU forward Karson Templin said. “Last year we had a similar end to our season. We kind of tailed off at the end of the regular season, lost some games. So I think this year we really wanted to emphasize that we’re going to get back to what we do, and we’re going to make a run in March and keep this momentum going.”
Nevada’s two leading sources of offense this season, Corey Camper Jr. and Elijah Price, could not get anything going. Camper went 3-for-12 from the field for just nine points and Price was made just 1 of 5 field goal attempts for only six points.
“There has to be a want to win the fight. You got to fight in the paint. That’s a toughness thing,” Calhoun said. “Second-chance points, pushing Elijah off the block, trying to make it hard on him. He’s a good player. To hold him to six and Camper to nine, that’s pretty impressive. I thought our physicality and winning the fight tonight was really good.”
Physical, shot-denying defense reigned on both sides at the start the game as the Aggies and Wolf Pack combined to miss their first 10 shots. It wasn’t until the 17:30 mark when USU forward Adlan Elamin made a fast break layup, which barely caught the far side of the rim, did anyone watching get to see points put on the scoreboard.
Utah State was the first to emerge from the scoring funk, and not just because of Elamin’s basket. The Aggies strung together a few buckets and built early leads of 4-0, 11-5 and 23-16 as the half progressed. Nevada fought back on most occasions to get the game back to a one-possession contest, but by the end of the first half the Aggies had a seven-point advantage, 39-32.
At the start of the second half, the Aggies hit the accelerator by almost instantly doubling its halftime advantage in building a 48-34 lead less than five minutes into the latter half. The lead later ballooned to as high as 21.
Yesterday, the Aggies’ offense came largely from its two star players, MJ Collins and Mason Falslev. The pair went for a combined 44 points in the win over UNLV. But against Nevada, the scoring was far more balanced. Elamin led the way with 15 points and was one of five Aggies that reached double figures. Collins, Falslev and Drake Allen each had exactly 12 points.
The rebounding was also egalitarian with the guards getting in on the glass-cleaning. Allen nearly got himself a double-double with nine rebounds. Collins was seond with seven and Elamin grabbed six.
There was really only one stretch where Nevada had a considerable edge in the flow of play, but it came too late for it to do anything but make the game mildly more interesting in the final minutes. The Wolf Pack, after shooting 33% in the first 30 minutes of the game, made 9 of 12 shot attempts in an eight minute span. That led to the Aggies’ game-high 21-point lead being trimmed to as low as 11.
In the end, Utah State posted the dictionary defenition of a full team win. The balance on offense plus a complete buy-in on defense. It was also a showcase of depth. Players who normally didn’t play many minutes earned there way to extra playing time. Guys like Elamin and Zach Keller. Both players ended up playing far above their minutes average with Elamin playing 28 and Keller playing a season-high 27.
For Elamin, his 15 points, six rebounds were a significant bounce-back given he had three points and five rebounds in his last four games combined.
“I just really focused on making defensive plays and rebounding, and I knew the offense would come,” Elamin said. “So it was really just having trust in my teammates and my teammates having trust in me.”
Keller has seen an increased role lately, typically getting around 20 minutes, and has worked to do whatever is necessary to help his team, which included scoring seven points, grabbing four rebounds and drawing six fouls.
“No matter how many minutes I play, I’m trying to do what I can for our team to win, whether I play five or right here 26,” Keller said. “Whatever I can do to make an impact, I’m going to try my best to help our team in any way I can.”
