SAN DIEGO - The San Diego State men's basketball team opens defense of its back-to-back Mountain West regular-season crowns on Saturday afternoon with a 1 p.m. tip against UNLV in the Thomas & Mack Center, a building in which it has earned 16 wins against the Runnin' Rebels since the start of the 2008-09 season. The game is the conference opener for each program and will be broadcast on CBS.
OFF THE BOUNCE
Owners of the nation's eighth-best winning percentage since the start of the 2009-10 campaign and back-to-back Mountain West regular-season crowns, San Diego State opens defense of its 2020-21 Mountain West title on Saturday afternoon with a 1 p.m. tip off against the UNLV Runnin' Rebels in the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas.
San Diego State has won its last nine Mountain West games including a 5-0 mark in conference road contest and the last win in that streak came at the Thomas & Mack Center when the Aztecs clinched the 2020-21 Mountain West regular season title.
Since the beginning of the 2019-20 campaign, San Diego State's 61-10 record is the third best in the nation.
San Diego State continues to be an elite defensive team. Nationally, according to KenPom, the Aztecs are 9th in defensive efficiency, 16th in field goal percentage defense and 41st in 3-point percentage defense. San Diego State has held nine of its 11 opponents to less than 39.3 shooting from the field and denied Long Beach State (11/30) a 3-point field goal on all its 11 attempts.
The last time out, San Diego State defeated UC San Diego 78-57 in Viejas Arena. The victory was the 12th straight in the series, but the first with both schools competing as Division I programs.
In holding UC San Diego to 39.2 percent shooting, SDSU improved to 48-2 in the last 50 games in which it has held the opposition to 40 percent or less field goal shooting.
San Diego State outrebounded UC San Diego, 33-29, and has won 25 straight games when owning an advantage in the category.
SDSU is 60-2 the last 62 times it has shot better than its opponent and the Aztecs are 66-3 the last 69 times it has held its opponent to less than 60 points.
The Aztecs and Rebels are meeting for the 76th time in series history with SDSU holding a 38-37 advantage in the all-time series. The Aztecs once trailed the series, 26-6, but is 32-11 against the Rebels in the last 43 meetings.
San Diego State is 11-1 in its last 12 games at UNLV in Thomas & Mack Center. Since March 5, 2014, San Diego State is 11-1 against the Rebels in TMC, while the rest of the country is 42-78.
Since the start of the 2008-09 season, no Division I team has won more road games against a single opponent than San Diego State's 16 victories over UNLV at Thomas & Mack Center. Saint Mary's (at Loyola Marymount) and Vermont (vs. Hartford) are second with 13 wins.
San Diego State's 38 victories at Thomas & Mack Center since the start of the 2008-09 campaign (22 neutral and 16 road wins) are the most by any team in any building in which it has not played at least one home game. Villanova is second with 31 victories at Madison Square Garden.
Senior guard Trey Pulliam has reached double figure scoring in 7-of-11 games this season, including a game-high 15 points vs. Saint Mary's in the Jerry Colangelo Classic. He won the game's Most Valuable Player in that contest adding six assists and a steal to his 15 points. In the last five outings, he has shot 46.7 percent (21-of-45) with 23 assists, 16 rebounds, 10 steals and one block. In the four games since his backcourt running mate Lamont Butler went down, he has played 142 of a possible 160 minutes, the most minutes in a four-game stretch in his major college career. He has averaged 10.3 points, 3.8 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 2.0 steals in those three games. In two career games at UNLV, he averages 11.0 points on 8-of-13 shooting from the field (.615), 2-of-4 from the bonus distance with 9 assists, two steals and four rebounds.
Senior guard Matt Bradley quietly scored 13 points, including three 3-pointers to go along with six assists, five rebounds and two steals. In his last seven games he has shot 42.9 percent (39-of-91) from the field and has six double digit scoring games, including back-to-back 22-point efforts at No. 24 Michigan and vs. Cal State Fullerton.
Senior forward Nathan Mensah rejected two shots against UC San Diego, is No. 4 on the program's career blocks list (box below) and is one block from equaling Malcolm Thomas for 3rd on the program's all-time list. He has multiple blocks in eight straight games (22 total) and at least one blocked shot (35 total) in his last 18 games. In four career games against UNLV, Mensah has averaged 7.8 points (9-of-17 FGs), 5.8 rebounds and 1.0 blocks in 20.0 minutes per contest. Set a career-high with 19 points on 9-of-12 FGs against UC San Diego.
Senior guard Adam Seiko has scored 42 points in the last five games, after totaling 13 in the first four contests of the season. He scored a season-high 12 points on the strength of a career-high four three-point field goals (4-4 3FGs) against Saint Mary's and sandwiched that between a pair of 11-point contests vs. Cal State Fullerton & vs. UC San Diego. His output vs. Saint Mary's was just the ninth time in the Dutcher/Fisher era that an SDSU player has been perfect from three-point range, minimum four attempts, in a game. In the last three contests Seiko was at one point 10-of-10 from the bonus distance. In his career, when he hits at least two treys in a game, the Aztecs are 16-3.
San Diego State will more than likely be without sophomore guard Lamont Butlerfor the fifth consecutive game. Butler, who had 11 points, three assists and three steals in the Long Beach State, suffered a wrist injury and missed both the Michigan and Cal State Fullerton contests. For the season, the sophomore is averaging 9.7 points (3rd on the team), 2.1 rebounds and 2.0 assists.
Brian Dutcher is in his fifth season as San Diego State's head coach and his 23rd season on the Aztec sidelines. In his four plus seasons as head coach, he has led the Aztecs to four conference titles, a 104-34 overall record and has already been named the national coach of the year and twice named Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year. Among first time head coaches who started in the 2017-18 season, Dutcher's 104 wins are the most and he is the only head coach in the group to reach triple-digit victories.
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