SAN DIEGO - In the midst of a late season push for seeding in the Mountain West and NCAA tournaments, the San Diego State Aztecs continue league play on Tuesday evening at Steve Fisher Court at Viejas Arena in San Diego, Calif., against the Fresno State Bulldogs.
OFF THE BOUNCE
The Aztecs and Bulldogs are meeting for the 130th time, the most frequent opponent SDSU has faced in program history. San Diego State is on an 11-game win streak against Fresno State, regardless of location, and is leading the series 73-56 heading into this game.
With its 64-47 win over Boise State on Saturday, San Diego State is tied for third place in the league standings, has earned a season sweep of the Broncos for the first time since 2020-21, and held BSU to its fewest points in a league loss since it joined the MW in 2011-12.
San Diego State is 9-0 this season when it holds its opponent to 60 or fewer points, including its 64-47 win over Boise State on Saturday. In the Brian Dutcher era, his Aztecs have held their opponent to 60 points or less 116 times and have won 109 of those games (109-7, 94.0 percent). Overall, Dutcher’s Aztecs have held their opponent to 60 or fewer points in 45.0 percent (116-of-258) of the games he has coached.
At Colorado State on February 8, Magoon Gwath blocked two shots, reaching 52 for the season and passing Skylar Spencer for the program’s freshman blocks record. Last Tuesday at San Jose State, Gwath added four more swats, an additional six vs. Boise State and is now No. 8 on the program’s single-season list (62).
With a 3-pointer at 14:08 of the second half against Boise State, Wayne McKinney III passed the 1,000-point milestone. He accomplished the feat in 116 career games and enters the Fresno State game with 1,004 points. McKinney III is one of two active players 6-0 or shorter that have scored at least 1,000 career points and blocked at least 26 shots. (also: Alabama’s Mark Sears)
With six blocked shots against Boise State (2-15-25), Magoon Gwath set a San Diego State freshman single-game record for rejections. His six blocks matched Nathan Mensah for the most by a player under Brian Dutcher. Mensah blocked six shots against Saint Mary’s on December 22, 2020 in San Luis Obispo, Calif.
Senior guard Nick Boyd enters the Fresno State game five points from the 1,000-point plateau and can become the second Aztecs in as many games to reach the milestone. (Wayne McKinney III passed 1,000 career points in the Boise State game on Saturday)
In three of the past five games, San Diego State has had second half scoring runs of 20-0, 18-0 & 17-0 all which contributed to comeback wins. Overall SDSU has had 17 scoring runs of at least 10-0 this season and has not been beaten in any of the 12 games in which it strung together at least a run of 10-0. Since the start of the 2020-21 season, the Aztecs are 75-8 in games in which they put together a scoring run of at least 10-0.
San Diego State, one of the most dominant defensive teams in the nation, ranked in the top 20 in Kenpom’s Adjusted Defensive Efficiency in nine of the last 14 years, in the top 10 in seven of the last 14 campaigns, and is currently No. 7 in that ranking. Additionally, the Aztecs are No. 1 in block percentage, No. 2 in effective field goal percentage defense, No. 5 in 2-point percentage defense, and No. 16 3-point percentage defense according to Kenpom.
Head men’s basketball coach Brian Dutcher reached a Mountain West coaching milestone with the team’s 63-61 win over Wyoming on February 1. Dutcher became just the fourth coach in league history to record 100 conference wins (currently 102 victories). He joined Aztecs Hall of Famer Steve Fisher (No. 1 with 168 wins), Leon Rice (No. 2 with 153 wins), and Steve Alford (No. 3 with 128 wins) as the only coaches in Mountain West history to record triple digit league victories. Dutcher reached the milestone in 135 games, faster than any of the previous three. Alford did it in 151 games, Rice in 173 and Fisher in 190.
Sophomore Miles Byrd was named one of the final 10 players in the nation vying for the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame’s Julius Erving Award for the top small forward in college basketball. An all around talent, he is the only player in the nation who is shooting a minimum of .389 from the field, .339 from distance, .841 from the line with at least 54 assists, 41 steals and 20 blocks.
Since the start of the 2013-14 season, when the current slate of teams in the Mountain West came together, San Diego State’s 156-53 (.746) record is the best in the Mountain West in conference games. Boise State ranks second with a 141-72 (.662) mark.
San Diego State is the No. 1 ranked team in the nation in field goal percentage defense (.368) and one of two teams in the nation which is limiting opponents to no more than a combined 37.0 percent overall from the floor and 29.5 percent from long distance. (also: Tennessee)
Since the start of the 2017-18 season, when Brian Dutcher took the helm of the San Diego State program, he has the No. 5 win percentage in the nation (194-64, 75.2 percent) and since the start of the 2019-20 campaign his Aztecs are 151-40 (79.1 percent), the third best record in the country behind only Gonzaga (168-28, 85.7 percent) and Houston (169-31, 84.5 percent).
How rare was San Diego State’s 68-76 loss on January 18 to UNLV, a Quad 3 defeat? Until that night, it had been 65 games or 1,792 days since the Aztecs had lost to either a Quad 3 or Quad 4 opponent. The last Quad 3 or Quad 4 team to defeat SDSU was Quad 3-UNLV on February 22, 2020, which halted that year’s longest win-streak to open the year, 26 games, and was the only loss suffered in the regular season.
In the Aztecs win over Colorado State (Jan. 14) sophomore Miles Byrd scored a career-high 25 points, including five 3-pointers, grabbed six rebounds and had seven steals. He is the first player in Mountain West history to have a game with those numbers and just the third in the nation in the last 16 years.
In San Diego State’s last 13 wins it shot .445 from the field, including .315 from the bonus distance, and averaged 72.4 points per game, with an average margin of victory of 12.5 points. Defensively, in those games, the team limited its opponents to a .357 shooting percentage, including .284 from beyond the arc and for the season has limited the opposition to 36.8 percent shooting overall, which ranks No. 1 nationally.
The Aztecs have held 12 of their 22 Division I opponents to less than 40 percent shooting, eight games of less than 35.0 percent and three under 30.0 percent. SDSU limited the California Bears to just 25.5 percent shooting on Dec. 21, the third lowest opponent field goal percentage shooting night in the Brian Dutcher era.
San Diego State, which in 2024 reached the Mountain West Tournament championship game for the seventh time in head coach Brian Dutcher’s seven seasons, looks for its unprecedented 17th Mountain West men’s basketball title. Entering the 2024-25 season, San Diego State has won nine regular season and seven Mountain West tournament titles, the most of any program that has ever been a member of the league.
Brian Dutcher is in his eighth season as San Diego State’s head coach and his 26th season on the Aztec sidelines. In his seven-plus seasons as head coach, he has led the Aztecs to five conference titles, seven Mountain West championship game appearances, a 193-64 overall record and 102-36 mark in league games, both league leading in that time frame, has been named the national coach of the year, twice the Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year and led this team to back-to-back Sweet 16s including a run to the 2023 NCAA national championship game.