San Diego, Calif. – Jon Rothstein, one of college basketball's most respected voices, has predicted the San Diego State men's basketball team to finish the 2019-20 season in second place in the Mountain West standings and singled out three players for individual recognition.
Rothstein, who is the College Basketball Insider for CBS Sports, Sports Illustrated and WFAN radio in New York City, announced his prediction on Twitter this week.
The Aztecs went 21-13 in 2018-19 and entered the 2019 Mountain West Tournament as a No. 4 seed. After defeating UNLV and No. 14/17 Nevada for the second time in three meetings last year, SDSU played in the championship game for the fifth time in the last seven years falling to Utah State.
San Diego State, which returns six of its top nine scorers from last year, is one of just nine schools nationally to win at least 19 games each of the last 14 seasons and is one of 29 schools to play in seven of the last 10 NCAA tournaments.
Having to replace its starting backcourt, SDSU will look to a pair of transfers to fill the void, junior Malachi Flynn and graduate KJ Feagin. Flynn and Feagin have averaged a combined 13.6 points, 3.8 assists and 2.9 rebounds in their college careers at Washington State and Santa Clara, respectively. Those numbers are higher than the career combined stats of last year's starting backcourt.
Based on his statistics from the 2017-18 season, his final at Washington State, Flynn would enter the 2019-20 season with Mountain West rankings of first in steals (49), third in scoring (15.8/g), free throw percentage (.846), assist-to-turnover ratio (2:1), and three pointers (77), fourth in assists (132) and fifth in three-point percentage (.338) & field goal percentage (.357).
Rothstein honored Flynn with selection as a first-team All-Mountain West honoree in his preseason predictions and, along with Feagin the pair were identified by Rothstein as two of the top-10 Impact Mountain West Transfers.
Feagin has scored more than 1,000 points in his career (1,182) and was a three-time All-West Coast Conference honoree at Santa Clara. Based on his last full season stats (2017-18), he would enter the 2019-20 season with Mountain West rankings of second in scoring (17.5/g), assists (125) and free throw percentage (.868), third in assist-to-turnover ratio (1.7:1), fourth in three-point percentage (.372), and field goal percentage (.443).
Sophomore Nathan Mensah, who returns as the team's leading rebounder (5.5/g), shot blocker (39) and percentage shooter (.541), has been predicted to be one of the top-5 breakout players in the Mountain West. Mensah averaged 11.8 points, 11.7 rebounds and 2.4 blocks per 40 minutes played last season.
Last month, Feagin was rated as the No. 2 point guard by ESPN and STADIUM on each outlets list of transfers who are immediately available to play in 2019-20.
For information on season tickets, mini plans and single-game tickets for the 2019-20 season, contact the Aztec Ticket Office at (619) 283-7378.