Sept. 5, 2008
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| No. 10: San Diego State 86, Brigham Young 74 |
February 24, 2007 | Recap | Stats | Notes
Fresh off a victory at New Mexico and having won six of its last seven, San Diego State welcomed No. 21/22 Brigham Young to Cox Arena in a nationally televised game. The game provided the Aztecs the opportunity to win their 20th game for the second straight season, beat consecutive nationally ranked opponents for the first time since 1988 and snap the MWC-leading Cougars' eight-game winning streak. With all of that on the line, SDSU came out firing on all cylinders, led 22-4 at one point in the first half and led wire-to-wire en route to the 86-74 win.
Why it was memorable: After beginning the Mountain West Conference season with a 2-4 record, San Diego State began playing like the team that started the season with eight straight victories by winning six of its last seven conference games. Following tough road games at Wyoming and New Mexico, the Aztecs were faced with another tall challenge in Brigham Young. However, behind the dynamic senior duo of Brandon Heath and Mohamed Abukar, the Cougars had no chance of emerging with their ninth straight win on that night.
The game started with a reverse alley-oop dunk off a pass from Mohamed Abukar that fired up the sold-out Cox Arena crowd of 12,414.
From there it was game over.
After BYU tied the score at 4, the Aztecs went on an 18-0 run to stifle the Cougar attack and the rout was on. Later, SDSU's lead grew to 23 points, at 30-7, on Heath's 12th point in just over nine and a half minutes. Brigham Young never got closer than 13 points the rest of the half and San Diego State ended the first period with a 43-25 lead behind Heath's 18 points and Abukar and Lorrenzo Wade's eight apiece.
In the second half, it was more of the same - all Aztecs. SDSU gave the visitors a steady dose of Heath and Abukar to keep the advantage at a comfortable double-digit distance until a three-pointer by Austin Ainge trimmed the San Diego State lead to nine. Unfortunately for BYU, there was only 56 seconds left in the game and a free throw and a lay-up by Heath quickly squashed any thought of a Cougar comeback.
Heath finished with his second straight 30-point effort with a game-high 30 points, while Abukar poured in a career-best 27 points on 11 of 16 shooting. Also scoring in double-figures were Habel (12 points) and Wade (10 points).