Aztecs Lose to Tumble Into Last

The long, steady decent through the Western Athletic Conference standings is over for the San Diego State basketball team.

Six weeks to the night on which they ended the first week of conference play in first place, the Aztecs find themselves last among the nine WAC teams.

That was the dubious reward for a 71-67 loss to Wyoming Saturday night in front of 8,511 at the Arena-Auditorium.

The loss was the Aztecs’ 10th in the past 12 conference games after a 2-0 start, dropping them 10-14 overall, 4-10 in the conference. The victory allowed Wyoming (12-14, 4-8) to escape the cellar for the first time in three weeks.

It has been puzzling slide for a team that less than two months ago played two Top 20 teams into the final minutes.

“We played teams like Tennessee and North Carolina really well,” senior forward Shawn Bell said. “In our minds, we felt we would be real successful. But after a couple of losses I don’t know how well we handled things. We kind of wondered about how good are we really?”

A quick look at what happened against Wyoming should answer the question, because this was a loss much like other recent SDSU defeats. The Aztecs were in the game for much of the way but at a crucial time found a way to commit the kinds of turnovers that would turn a see-saw game into another defeat.

This breakdown came in a series of three consecutive turnovers in little more than a minute, helping to turn a 61-59 lead into a 64-61 deficit with 6:19 to play. It would be the last lead change in a game that had 21, plus 13 ties, before the Aztecs fell behind for good.

SDSU had a similar turnover spell in a 73-60 loss to Hawaii Thursday, when almost every mistake led to an easy basket. That again was the problem against the Cowboys. Ten of the Aztecs’ 14 turnovers led to 17 Wyoming points.

“They were all killers,” SDSU Coach Jim Brandenburg said. “A lot of them ended up as cheap baskets at the other end. Turnovers are one thing, if you can go play some defense at the other end, but when you give up layins at other end, that’s what really kills you. And that is what was going on.”

Despite those troubles, the Aztecs stayed in the game to the end. But after Bell scored the last of his team-high 16 points on a basket with 2:11 left to cut the Wyoming lead to 70-67, the Aztecs were shut out.

Their only shots came on a 12-foot turnaround jumper by senior forward Sam Johnson with 1 minute left and a three-point try by junior guard Kevin Honaker with 5 seconds left. Honaker’s shot came after Wyoming guard Reggie Fox clinched the victory by making the second of two free-throw attempts with 18 seconds to play.

“I’m disappointed we didn’t win the basketball game because it was winable game,” Brandenburg said. “This was a tough loss for us.”

One made tougher by the position it places the Aztecs in for the conference tournament. They find themselves in the position of likely having to win at least one of their final two WAC games to avoid being the ninth seed. That the games are against the conference’s top two teams--New Mexico and Texas El Paso--and on the road make them even tougher.

SDSU has lost eight in a row on the road and 24 of the past 25 conferences games outside of San Diego.

And if there is one player who symbolizes the frustration of the Aztecs on the road, it is center Mitch McMullen.

McMullen, the team’s leading scorer and rebounder, fouled out after scoring only eight points and getting four rebounds in 22 minutes. It was the fifth time in nine road games this season McMullen has fouled out.