ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – After wrapping up the regular season on Saturday with 28 wins, just one loss and the No. 1 seed in the upcoming 2020 Air Force Reserve Mountain West Men's Basketball Championship Tournament, its now award season and in the San Diego State Aztecs received the lion's share of the recognition from the media that cover the league on a regular basis.
Junior guard Malachi Flynn was named the Mountain West Player of the Year, Newcomer of the Year and a first-team All-Mountain West selection. Head coach Brian Dutcher is the Coach of the Year, junior forward Matt Mitchell, senior forward Yanni Wetzell and senior guard KJ Feagin earned second-team, third-team and honorable mention designation, respectively.
A native of Tacoma, Wash., Flynn finished the regular season averaging 17.6 points, 5.1 assists and 4.4 rebounds while shooting 44.7 percent from the floor, 37.2 percent from long range and 85.7 percent from the line. In league games, he was even more impressive. His scoring average went up to 18.9 points on 45.3 percent shooting including 34.7 percent from distance and 91.7 percent from the charity stripe. Earning starting assignments in all 29 games this season, the junior scored in double figures 28 times, led the team the team in scoring and in assists 19 times.
In the team's regular season finale, an 83-76 win at Nevada, Flynn poured in 36 points which are the most by an Aztec player since Brandon Heath tallied 37 against UNLV on Jan. 15, 2005 and he is just the eighth player in college basketball this season to produce a stat line of 36 points, five rebounds and five assists and the first from a Mountain West Conference team. His 36 points are the second most by an Aztec player this century. For his efforts last week, Flynn earned his second Mountain West Player of the Week honor this season. In addition, he is a Sporting News Midseason second-team All-American, as well as on the watch lists for the Bob Cousy Point Guard of the Year, Lute Olson National Player of the Year and John R. Wooden Award. He was named the tournament MVP of both the Continental Tires Las Vegas Invitational and the Basketball Hall of Fame Classic.
Flynn was the top vote getter (163 points) to earn first-team honors and was given nine of the 11 votes for both Player and Newcomer of the Year.
Third-year head coach Brian Dutcher was the unanimous choice for Coach of the Year, receiving all 11 votes. Dutcher has led the 2019-20 Aztecs to the best regular season record in program history (28-1) and the No. 1 seed in next week's Mountain West Men's Basketball Championship Tournament. With 17 league victories, San Diego State set a school and Mountain West Conference record for most conference victories in a campaign. San Diego State's 17-1 conference record is the highest winning percentage ever for a Mountain West Conference team, eclipsing Utah's 13-1 mark in 2004-05. Under his guidance, SDSU was the last unbeaten team in the nation for more than a month from Jan. 15 to Feb. 22 and is currently the last one-loss team in the NCAA.
The Aztecs were the first team to clinch its conference's regular-season title and is the first to do so with four games remaining in the season since the 2007-08 Davidson team of Steph Curry. In addition, the squad is a perfect 14-0 in road/neutral games this year and is the only team without a loss in a road/neutral game this season and are 10-0 in NET Quadrant 1 and Quadrant 2 games. Remarkably, nine of those 10 games came either on the road or on a neutral court.
Mitchell earned his first all-conference accolades after averaging 13.8 points on 50.3 percent shooting, 41.2 percent from three-point range and 89.4 percent from the line in league play. He grabbed 5.6 rebounds and dished out 1.6 assists. For the season his numbers were equally impressive. He scored 12.4 points pulled down 4.8 assists and assisted on 1.7 buckets per contest. Coming off the bench in the first 13 games he averaged 10.8 points, 4.3 rebounds and 1.5 assists. Since being inserted in the starting line-up he is scoring 13.6 points, grabbing 5.2 rebounds, and dishing out 1.8 assists. His field goal shooting is up to 51.1 percent from 43.8; three-point shooting is at 41.1 percent compared to 37.5 percent in the first 13 games and his free throw shooting is up nine points (from 81.0-to-90.0). With 22 points against New Mexico, he became the 34th player in SDSU history to reach 1,000-career points.
The Riverside, Calif., native reached double digit point totals in 13-of-18 conference games, including a season-high 28 points, 24 of which came in the second half, against Utah State where he went 9-of-14 from the floor including 4-of-6 from beyond the arc.
Wetzell, a grad transfer originally from Auckland, New Zealand, is a two-time Mountain West Player of the Week and a member of the Continental Tires Las Vegas Invitational All-Tournament Team. After averaging 5.9 points, 3.8 rebounds and 0.3 assists last season at Vanderbilt, Wetzell has blossomed at San Diego State. He is averaging 11.6 points, 6.4 rebounds and 1.4 assists. His 59.8 percent field goal percentage is the sixth best in Aztec single-season history. He has reached double digit scoring in 18-of-29 game this year compared to 9-of-32 last season. He's led the team in rebounds 12 times, scoring three times and assists twice. At San Diego he established career-highs in points (20) and at that time rebounds (12). In the game he was 9-of-11 from the field and hit the first three pointer of the season. He has shot 50 percent or better in 23-of-29 games this year. At Wyoming he was a perfect 7-of-7 from the floor, including 3-of-3 from long range, and became the fourth player in the Brian Dutcher/Steve Fisher era to make at least seven field goals without a miss in a game.
Feagin, a graduate transfer from Santa Clara, was an elite scorer as a Bronco, but has made defense his focus this season. In large part due to his efforts, San Diego State leads the Mountain West in most defensive categories, including scoring defense (58.6), field goal percentage defense (38.0), three-point field goal percentage defense (28.3), defensive efficiency.
According to Synergy, in the 231 possessions in which the player he is guarding has ended the possession, he has allowed just 54-of-194 field goal shooting (27.8 percent), and 0.632 points per possession. Among players with at least 225 defensive possessions, his defensive field goal percentage is second nationally. He averaged 9.3 points, 3.3 rebounds and 2.6 assists in league play, but in four of the last eight games has scored 14 of more points and in his last eight contests is averaging 11.9 points, 2.6 rebounds and 2.8 assists. In that time period his shot 43.7 percent from the floor, including 44.6 percent from the bonus distance and has 24 treys.
Voting was conducted independent of Mountain West oversight by media directly covering teams in all 11 league markets. In markets where more than one outlet covers a team closely, beat reporters from competing publications or outlets submitted a joint ballot, giving each market one vote.
Voters ranked players 1 through 15 for first-, second- and third-team All-Mountain West with the top player getting 15 points and on down to the 15th player receiving one point.
San Diego State returns to action on Thursday as the No. 1 seed at the MW Championship in Las Vegas, Nev. The Aztecs will face the winner of the matchup between eighth-seed Fresno State and ninth-seed Air Force. The game tips at 11:30 a.m. PT at UNLV's Thomas & Mack Center.
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