No. 22 Colorado State battled well on the road Wednesday night. After going into the Pit as 7-point underdogs, the Rams were tied with the Lobos at halftime and had an opportunity to shoot for the win in the final seconds. Unfortunately for the Green & Gold, as close as they came, it was New Mexico that pulled out the 68-66 win down in Albuquerque.
Donovan Dent was the hero for UNM. The sophomore guard went coast to coast for the game-winning layup and completed the 3-point play at the line just seconds after Isaiah Stevens had put CSU up with a pair of clutch free throws on the other end.
As mentioned before, the Rams still had a chance to knock down a game-winner themselves. After advancing past midcourt and calling a timeout, CSU got the ball to Nique Clifford in the final moments. He was immediately smothered, though, and even if his three had gone in, it did not appear that the shot was completely out of his hand before the buzzer.
For the Rams, the loss is a tough pill to swallow. CSU was right there and had a chance to steal a win in the toughest road environment in the Mountain West. It would have been huge for their NCAA Tournament resume and it would have allowed them to potentially play for a regular season conference title. The Lobos simply executed better than the Rams did over the final 30 seconds. On both sides of the ball, when the game was on the line, UNM was able to get it done.
Here are some more takeaways from Wednesday night.
Slow starts were tough to overcome
The fact that this game was as tight as it was shows how resilient CSU can be. Going down 13-2 to open would be a death sentence for a lot of teams in that environment. And the Rams had just as slow of a start to begin the second half. Even so, they found a way to hang around and at least have a shot to win the game.
The counter to that of course is had the Rams been able to start a little quicker, they would not have had to work so hard to get back into it. Instead of constantly trying to strike back, CSU could have been striking first and initiating the pressure. It’s a tough way to make a living when you are constantly playing catch up. But that’s kind of like saying that it’s better to win than lose. (No shit).
All things considered, the Rams showed a ton of heart with the way they fought back in it. But scoring a combined 7 points over the first 5 minutes of each half was not conducive to pulling off the upset. Joel Scott can’t be the only guy that comes out with an edge.
Too many unforced errors
UNM is a terrific defensive team and the way they harass opponents is next level. I felt like their defensive intensity caused the Rams to make some mistakes that we don’t typically see from this veteran team.
Whether it was driving and putting up layups that never had a chance to go in, or sloppily trying to force a pass that had almost zero shot at success, the Rams just had a lot of moments that felt uncharacteristic. Sometimes that will happen against a good team on the road. But it was certainly a big factor in the loss.
CSU had three times as many turnovers as UNM and shot less than 50 percent on 2-point attempts. The Rams just did not look very crisp offensively and it shows in the stats.
The Rams are now 2-5 this season when they record 15 or less assists as a team. They’re 18-2 when finishing with 16 or more.
The Rams are 17-1 when they score 75 or more points. They’re 3-6 when held below 75 points on the season.
A missed opportunity but not a bad loss
The silver lining is that while a close defeat like this always stings — it was a missed opportunity to really make some noise after already beating first-place Utah State by 20 — a 2-point loss in a Quad 1 game is not the end of the world.
It puts a little more pressure on Saturday’s game against UNLV. Being realistic, though, a split this week was about the best you could expect. Road wins have not come consistently for anyone in the league, or even college basketball as a whole this season. Doesn’t make the losses sting any less, but that’s just the reality. There is a reason that CSU was a three-score underdog in the game despite being a ranked team.
Had the Rams pulled off the upset, it would have been one of the most impressive victories on their resume. But they came up short. So now it’s all about the response.
Scott and Stevens carried the Rams
Finally, while the outcome was not what anybody in Ram Nation hoped it would be, I would be remiss to not mention Joel Scott’s 18-point, 13-rebound performance. The big man was the only Ram to get to the free throw line more than once. And it was great to see him go 8-of-9 at the line in such a hostile road setting.
Isaiah Stevens was the x-factor in the second half for CSU, scoring 12 of his 20 points over the final 20 minutes. He very casually finished with 20 points, nine assists and five rebounds while shooting 75 percent from the floor. Stevens and Scott just unfortunately needed a little bit more production from the rest of the roster in this one.
