It is one of San Diego State coach Brian Dutcher’s favorite sayings: “It’s hard to win a college basketball game.”
Especially, apparently, when your roster of fourth-year juniors and fifth-year seniors plays one of Division I’s youngest teams.
The Aztecs had to grind out, gut out and sweat out another one against Nevada at Viejas Arena on Saturday night, just like they did here two days earlier in a game that was almost identical in tactics and tempo. This time they needed a buzzer-beating bank shot from Trey Pulliam to win 69-67.
After Grant Sherfield had tied it on a 3-pointer with 4.6 seconds left, the Aztecs inbounded to Pulliam on the left side. He dribbled the length of the court and hoisted a bank shot over Desmond Cambridge. The ball left his hand with a second left and went through the basket at the buzzer.
The officials went to the video monitor to confirm it, but both teams already knew what they would see. SDSU players celebrated. Nevada players and coach Steve Alford walked off the floor.
Otherwise, the script was the same as Thursday’s 65-60 win: Trail for less than a minute but never get any kind of separation as the Wolf Pack hung around like that oblivious party guest, refusing to take the hint that it was time to go home.
And then get bailed out by a clutch 3 from Jordan Schakel.
Just as they had Thursday, the Aztecs took a late lead and lost a late lead. A 60-51 margin became 62-62 after they alternated between turnovers and missed shots.
But Schakel rattled in a 3 with 36 seconds left after doing little for the opening 39 minutes, perhaps because he took a hard shot in the ribs early and was treated by the SDSU medical staff.
Nevada pulled within one on a pair of free throws from K.J. Hymes, and the Aztecs inbounded to … Nathan Mensah?
It was a curious choice, considering Mensah was 1 of 4 from the line and two of nation’s best free throw shooters were on the floor in Schakel and Terrell Gomez. But Mensah calmly made both, setting up what Sherfield thought was a tying dagger that would send the game to overtime.
Matt Mitchell led the Aztecs with 20 points, the same amount he scored Thursday, to go with eight rebounds and three assists. Mensah had 15 points and six rebounds. Pulliam had seven points and three assists.
Sherfield led the Wolf Pack (8-5, 3-3) with 20 points. Cambridge had 17, and Hymes came off the bench for 14 despite battling foul trouble all night.
Alford had a decision to make with six minutes left in the first half and his team down six. Starting center Warren Washington had two fouls. Hymes, his backup, had two as well.
Play them?
Sit them?
Alford opted to go with 6-8 Kearny High alum Robby Robinson, who is more wing than true post, and later 6-7 freshman DeAndre Henry instead, risking that SDSU’s lead wouldn’t grow with Washington and Hymes both on the bench.
It didn’t. The Wolf Pack did what it did repeatedly in the first game Thursday, hanging around and coming back. It got baskets from three guys who average 4.6, 4.3 and .9 points to draw even before Mitchell made a 3 at the halftime buzzer for a 34-31 margin.
After making just four 3s two days earlier, the Aztecs opened 2 of 5 en route to a 14-4 lead. But they made just one of the next 10 beyond the arc before Mitchell’s trey. That came from grad transfer Terrell Gomez, who went scoreless Thursday for the first time in his collegiate career, a span of 106 games.
Alford went back to the 7-foot Washington to start the second half. On SDSU’s first possession, he got his third foul and was replaced by the 6-10 Hymes. Two minutes later, Hymes had three, too, and both were on the bench.
The Aztecs relentlessly pounded the ball inside against their understudies, with Aguek Arop coming off the bench for six second-half points on a variety of spins and fakes. They just couldn’t capitalize on the scoreboard.
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