SDSU Opens Its Basketball Season Tonight at UCSB

San Diego State opens its 1986-87 basketball season against UC Santa Barbara tonight at 7:30.

The Aztecs, trying to better last season’s 10-19 record, need to do a better job rebounding.

SDSU was outrebounded by Athletes in Action Tuesday, 57-25, in losing the exhibition game, 97-80.

“We have to do a better job inside,” Coach Smokey Gaines said. “We don’t have players with bulk like we had in the past.”

SDSU’s bulkiest player is 6-foot 8-inch center Gerald Murray, who is a little too bulky now. Gaines thinks the 260-pound Murray is 15 pounds overweight.

Murray, a fourth-year junior who missed last season with a fractured right kneecap, is important to SDSU’s hopes. He is the only Aztec with more than a year of major college experience.

SDSU will start three sophomores--guards Tracy Dildy (5-10) and Josh Lowery (6-4) and forward Johnny Scruggs (6-4). Forwards Juan Espinoza (6-8) and Rodney Hawkins (6-8), both community college transfers, are also key players. The Aztecs lost their first seven games last season.

“We don’t get to play six or seven exhibition games to fine-tune ourselves like they do in the NBA,” Gaines said. “We still have a young ballclub. We can’t get really excited about it right now because we lost about 60 points a game from last year.”

SDSU started five seniors most of last season, but its remaining players were freshmen and walk-ons from the football team.

Aztec Notes

Smokey Gaines has a 6-1 record in season openers with the Aztecs. Gaines has a seven-year record of 107-92 at SDSU. . . . SDSU leads its all-time series against Santa Barbara, 49-31. When the teams last met two seasons ago, SDSU won in San Diego, 84-69. . . . Santa Barbara lost its season opener to Santa Clara, 73-65, Friday night.