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LOGAN — Utah State entered Saturday's game at San Jose State unblemished against Quad 2 opponents and in dire need of another win in order to keep its at-large bid hopes in good standing.
Instead, the Aggies stumble back to Logan in bitter fashion after allowing a much-improved Spartans squad to take over the game late and pull off a signature 69-64 upset win.
Utah State led by as much as 5 points in the second half before Spartans guard Omari Moore took the game over, where he burned the Aggies on downhill drives and scored 16 points in the final 10 minutes.
Utah State had a 1-point lead with 2:32 remaining, but San Jose State hit back-to-back second-chance buckets, including a layup from Moore with 1:01 remaining to take a 65-62 lead.
The Aggies failed to deliver on the other end, as Max Shulga missed the front end of a one-and-one opportunity, and Taylor Funk's potential game-tying 3-pointer was blocked with six seconds left to seal the Spartans win.
Utah State drops to 8-5 in Mountain West play and suffers its first back-to-back losses of the year.
"I don't even know what to say, honestly," junior guard Sean Bairstow said. "Just don't think we played to what we know we can do. We didn't finish the plays that we usually do."
Although Aggies head coach Ryan Odom said the team was "jazzed and wanted to play," the Aggies seemed to lack energy in front of a sparse crowd at the Event Center. The team trailed 13-2 to open the game and never looking in sync throughout the night.
Against the best rebounding team in the Mountain West, the Aggies were outrebounded 36-27 and fell to 3-5 when losing the battle of the boards. Defensively, Utah State had several different players guard Moore in the second half, but each failed to contain him; the senior finished with a game-high 27 points.
"Moore made a ton of really good plays down the stretch, got to his right hand and the open floor, and finished them to his credit," Odom said. "We had good enough rebounds, that, you know, key rebounds that we needed at the right times. And then we didn't make the shots that we needed to make."
Forward Dan Akin (12 points) and center Trevin Dorius (11 points) provided a lift to the team throughout the night; Akin scored 8 quick points off the bench to tie the game at 17-all, and Dorius was successful on the receiving end of the pick-and-roll in the second half.
Dorius suffered his fourth foul of the game with just over 16 minutes left in the game and didn't return. His foul trouble — and the coaching staff's decision not to bring him back into the game — turned out to be costly. In his absence, defensively, the Aggies gave up 6 second-chance points and eased Moore's path to the rim.
The Aggies maintained the lead in the second half as Bairstow (10 points) hit two 3s and Ashworth (14 points) was perfect from the free-throw line. Though the Aggies shot a collective 34.5% in the half, Moore and the Spartans slowly took over, and Utah State lacked the offensive firepower to keep pace once it relinquished the lead.
"You have to score and you have to get the stops late," Odom said. "We weren't able to do that tonight; they were."
It's been a whiplash of a week for the Aggies. The team went from a bucket away from a signature Quad 1 win against San Diego State on Wednesday to having its at-large aspirations on life support with five games left in the regular season.
"It's two close games we've lost now in a row," Odom said. "It hurts, but we can't let it deter the rest of our season."
