HOUSTON – After junior guard Lamont Butler hit arguably the biggest shot in program history on Saturday night against Florida Atlantic, the San Diego State men's basketball team faces its last challenge tonight, a game against Connecticut to decide the national championship.
OFF THE BOUNCE
After defeating Florida Atlantic, for the third time in as many games and for the first time in the Final Four, San Diego State, the 5-seed and South Region Champion, will face 4-seed Connecticut, the West Region Champions, for the national championship on Monday, April 3, at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas.
San Diego State continues to make history the past two weeks. Head coach Brian Dutcher won his first NCAA Tournament game. The team defeated the overall No. 1-seed in the tournament and the No. 1-ranked team in the nation in Alabama. The team won its first Sweet 16, Elite 8 and Final Four games and now competes in its first national championship in men's basketball.
San Diego State is the first Mountain West program to win a game in the Sweet 16, Elite 8 or Final Four.
The Aztecs are making their 15th appearance in the Division I event, owning a 11-14 all-time record, including five wins in this year's tournament. Head coach Brian Dutcher has been on the Aztec sidelines for 22 of the program's 25 all-time tournament games and all 11 of the program's victories, including his first as the program's head coach in the team's first round game against Charleston on March 16.
This is the fourth NCAA appearance for Brian Dutcher as head coach. The two-time Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year, in his sixth season leading the program and had a likely appearance in the 2019-20 event (San Diego State was 30-2 and projected as a No. 1 or No. 2 seed), which was canceled because of the COVID pandemic.
The Aztecs appearance in the regional final game, the Final Four and now the national title game is their first and the first for a Mountain West program, which began competition in the 1999-00 season.
This is the program's 10th tournament appearance in the last 13 seasons in which a champion has been crowned. That total does not include the 2019-20 season when SDSU was 30-2 and ranked sixth in the AP poll when the season ended prior to the tournament.
San Diego State owns the third-best record in the nation, 108-22 (83.1 percent), since the start of the 2019-20 campaign. It trails only Gonzaga's 121-12 (91.0 percent), and Houston's 116-22 (84.1 percent), and is ahead of Baylor's 104-24 (81.3 percent) and Kansas' 111-26 (81.0 percent) records in that time frame.
SDSU comes into the national championship game having won 15 of its last 16 (15-1) and 19 of its last 21 (19-2), with its two losses coming on the road at Nevada (14-2 at home) and at Boise State (14-1 at home), both which earned NCAA Tournament bids.
San Diego State owns the fifth-best record in the nation since the start of the 2009-10 campaign, 364-115 (.760), and is 165-90 (.647) in road and neutral site contests in that time frame which is the sixth best in the nation.
San Diego State plays Connecticut in Monday's national championship game. The Huskies are a No. 5-seed and West Regional Champions. SDSU has a 0-1 record against the program, with its loss coming in the Sweet 16 in the 2011 NCAA Tournament.
The matchup between the 5-seed Aztecs and 4-seed Huskies will be the first time those two seeds have met for the national championship.
San Diego State was ranked for 13 of the 17 weeks of the regular season and as a ranked team in 2022-23 has a 23-6 record. The Aztecs have won nine straight and 15 of its last 15 as a member of the Associated Press top 25.
San Diego State has won 32 games this season, the second most in program history. Only the 2010-11 squad led by Kawhi Leonard had more victories (34).
San Diego State has won nine consecutive games, which is the third-longest active streak in the country.
San Diego State did not allow a fast break point in the South Regional (vs. [1] Alabama, [6] Creighton) and against [9] Florida Atlantic in the Final Four after allowing 25 in the first two rounds in Orlando (15 vs. College of Charleston and 10 vs. Furman).
In its first four NCAA Tournament games this season, San Diego State has limited the opposition to 17.0 percent shooting from three-point range (16-for-94).
San Diego State played in its sixth consecutive Mountain West Tournament title game, defeating Utah State, 62-57. Matt Bradley, who averaged 12.3 points and 3.0 rebounds, was named the tournament MVP. Jaedon LeDee, who reached double figure-scoring in two of three games and averaged 6.0 rebounds earned inclusion on the all-tournament team. The Aztecs and Aggies have played each other in four of the last five championship games and have a 2-2 split in those contests. Boise State was the interloper in last year's title matchup against San Diego State. Amazingly, SDSU has made the tournament title game in nine of the last 10 years and in 13 of the last 15 seasons (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 & 2023).
Since the start of the 2010-11 season, no program in the state of California has more 30-win seasons than San Diego State's four (2010-11, 2013-14, 2019-20 & 2022-23). UCLA has done it twice (2016-17 & 2022-23) and Saint Mary's once (2016-17).
Senior guard Matt Bradley became just the fifth player since at least the start of the 1996-97 season to score 1,000 points for two college programs. He scored 1,289 in three years at California and has totaled 1,025 in two seasons at San Diego State.
SDSU head coach Brian Dutcher is in his sixth season as San Diego State's head coach and his 24th season on the Aztec sidelines. In his five-plus seasons as head coach, he has led the Aztecs to five conference titles, a 151-46 (76.6 percent) 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 151 wins are the most in the nation.
After snapping College of Charleston's 10-game win streak in the NCAA First Round, Furman's seven-game win streak in the Second Round and No. 1/2 Alabama's five-game win streak in the Sweet 16, SDSU snapped Creighton's three-game win streak in the Elite 8 and on Saturday night ended Florida Atlantic's 11 game win streak.
Aztecs Face Huskies for the National Championship
