Aztecs’ 12-17 Season: One of Highs, Lows

The losingest and in some ways longest season of Jim Brandenburg’s coaching career was over, ended in the quarterfinals of the Western Athletic Conference tournament by a Wyoming team he had helped build.

As the San Diego State players dressed in another part of Marriott Center Thursday afternoon, Brandenburg stood somewhat uncomfortably in a hallway. Just where his thoughts were at the moment was hard to gauge.

Was he thinking about what went wrong in that final 83-76 loss, or was his mind on almost five months of practice and games that brought him to this conclusion?

A few minutes before, in his last postgame news conference of the season, he appeared to be in control and resigned to the understanding that his team tried hard but could not beat a superior Wyoming team. But by now, with the audience gone, he appeared only tired and distracted.

The season was over, but this was no time for instant analysis of his first year at SDSU.

“This is one I’m going to have to think about,” Brandenburg said wearily. “This is one that is going to take me two or three weeks to tell how I feel. I’m going to have to get away and cool down before I can evaluate it.”

The record says 12-17, 5-11 in the WAC regular season and an early exit from the conference tournament. By all measures of success Brandenburg has known, that is not a good season. But consider that the Aztecs were coming off a 5-25 season, the worst in school history, and the 1988 showing is not as difficult to accept.

Brandenburg might have begun the revitalization of the SDSU program.

“I sure hope so,” he said. “We have made some progress this year.”

In a losing season, there are numerous down notes, but the Aztecs also were a team that on some nights could rise to impressive performances. They handed No. 17 Brigham Young what was then only its second loss of the season, 82-80, in overtime. They defeated New Mexico, 64-59, when the Lobos were ranked No. 18 in the country. And they almost beat Wyoming in their first meeting, losing, 57-56, in a nationally televised game.

Those were the games that would impress any fan. But there were some smaller steps along the way that might have been just as important.

The Aztecs won consecutive games at Hawaii (59-58) and Miami (56-49) for their first road victories in two years and their first consecutive road victories since early in the 1984-85 season.

They won their own Holiday Bowl tournament for the first time since 1981 and only the third time in its 12-year history.

And they began to bring fans back into the San Diego Sports Arena. A crowd of 10,465, the second-largest SDSU crowd ever, saw the Aztecs defeat BYU. The Aztecs drew an average of 3,489 to their games at the Sports Arena, more than doubling last season’s 1,709.

Maybe just as important as what the Aztecs did on the court was what SDSU students did off the court. They voted overwhelmingly last week to pay for a new student activities center and arena with increased student fees.

The complex, expected to be completed in time for the 1991-92 season, will include a 10,000-seat arena for basketball.

Those are just some of the early signs that Brandenburg has begun to make an impression at SDSU.

“There were some good times this season,” Brandenburg said. “And when I look a back on it, I’m sure I’ll have a lot of good memories.”

But they will be tempered by the losses and disappointments. Brandenburg is not accustomed to losing. He never had a losing record in two seasons at Montana and nine at Wyoming.

He never ranted publicly after a loss, but the losing had an effect inside. One careful look at him after the last Wyoming defeat said as much.

“Do I look like I’ve gotten used to losing?” Brandenburg asked rhetorically.

Actually, he never did. But over the course of the season, Brandenburg’s mood changed after some losses. In the second weekend of the season, the Aztecs played poorly in losses to Arizona State and Tulsa in the Kactus tournament. At that time, Brandenburg could hardly restrain his disgust.

He spent much of the games on his feet, screaming at his players. Early in the season, that was a common posture for Brandenburg. But as the season wore on, he became ever so slightly less vocal from the bench.

The big change occurred during the Aztecs’ two-day swing to Air Force and Colorado State. SDSU had played poorly at the start in a 60-57 loss at Air Force and began even worse the next night against the Rams. Brandenburg was up and riding his team hard through much of the game, but halfway through the second half, when it appeared the Aztecs were too tired to attempt a comeback, Brandenburg became uncharacteristically subdued.

“I sensed the players had taken about as much from me as they could,” Brandenburg said later. “It was time to back off. If I pressed them any harder, I might have lost them. It was that close.”

The next week at practice, Brandenburg was enthusiastic in his praise and careful in his criticism. The result was the close loss to Wyoming followed by the victories at Hawaii and Miami.

“Coach Brandenburg is a great motivator,” said Mitch McMullen, junior center. “You don’t always like to hear him yell, but you know if you listen, he’ll make you a better player.”

At 6-feet 10-inches, McMullen was one of Brandenburg’s biggest projects. Considered a developer of centers, Brandenburg gave special attention to McMullen. He was a player typical of what Brandenburg had to work with in his first season at SDSU.

McMullen came to the Aztecs after two seasons of small-college and community-college basketball. Of the 10 players who completed the season, only three had played at SDSU last season--Juan Espinoza, Rodney Hawkins and Tony Ross. Only one had more than a single season of major-college experience--transfer Sam Johnson--and all of his were in two seasons at Eastern Michigan.

The rest of the players were a collection of freshmen, community-college transfers and a walk-on from the football team.

The Aztecs lost 10 players--all underclassmen--since Brandenburg took over the program last March. The reasons were varied--from academic to legal to personal to simply being told by Brandenburg that their future was limited.

The two biggest losses were guard Josh Lowery (suspended from school for a year after an on-campus fight) and center Gerald Murray (suspended from the team after his arrest on drug charges). Both probably would have been starters.

So Brandenburg made do.

“You could see his frustration at times,” McMullen said. “He wanted us to be so much better.”

The Aztecs never quite reached the heights Brandenburg had hoped, nor did they fall as low as they did last year when the team collapsed under Smokey Gaines, who resigned during the season.

“This team had more character than the one we had last year,” Hawkins said. “One thing this team had was a lot of heart.”

At almost every time the Aztecs seemed their lowest, they came right back with one of their better games of the season. The team seemed determined not let it slide away as it did the year before.

They followed an embarrassing home loss to the University of San Diego by winning three of their next four, including the Holiday Bowl tournament. They responded after a terrible trip to Utah and BYU by beating New Mexico at home. And they made up for their troubles at Air Force and Colorado State by playing Wyoming close and then winning at Hawaii and Miami.

Still, they never could put together a win streak that would have pushed them over .500 for the season. Their lack of depth, their anemic free-throw shooting (61.4%) and their high turnover ratio (476-364) were just some of the factors that plagued them all season.

“We have a long way to go to get this program where I want it to be,” Brandenburg said. “Next year should be better.”

The future is fairly uncertain but shows some promise. Espinoza, who missed a month of the season because of a fractured vertebra, and Hawkins are the only seniors. Four starters--Ross, McMullen, Williams and Johnson--return. Johnson’s status is unclear, as he must undergo his second major knee surgery in a year Monday to correct tendon damage that has bothered him all season.

The rest of the team will be made up of Brandenburg’s latest finds. He has three transfers waiting to become eligible next season--Michael Best, who started at guard as a freshman for Clemson; Shawn Bell, a forward from Morse High School who transferred from Chicago State, and Chris Singleton, a guard from Delgado College in New Orleans.

Brandenburg also signed two high school seniors during the early signing period last October--Kevin Rembert of Santa Ana’s Mater Dei and Alex Sund of Golden, Colo.

All are expected to contribute, and Best is likely to start next year.

Brandenburg has three scholarships still available and is looking to sign possibly another center, forward and guard.

Brandenburg will devote much of the next few months to that search.

“We hope this year was just the start,” Brandenburg said. “We’re going to get better. It’s just going to take a lot of hard work.”