There are several ways in basketball to know it’s just your night.
You can scan the box score and look at shooting percentages, rebounds, turnovers and fouls.
An even more sure-fire method of detection: not one but two banked-in 3-pointers.
BJ Davis banked in one at the halftime buzzer, then Miles Byrd did it from Alpine midway through the second half, and the fortuitous vibes carried through San Diego State’s 75-60 win against Colorado State on Tuesday night at Viejas Arena.
History said the Rams never really had a chance, even coming off three Mountain West wins by 22, 29 and 22 points, even with fond memories of leading 15-2 here last year.
It was a Quad 3 game according to the NET metric, which separates games into four quadrants based on location and the opponent’s ranking. And SDSU has now won 67 straight Quad 3 or lower games.
The other kiss of death: It followed an SDSU loss.
The Aztecs are now 35-4 in the last 39 games immediately following a loss, 37-1 in the last 38 when the next game after a loss is at Viejas Arena.
“We’re not alone,” Colorado State coach Niko Medved said. “They’ve done that to a lot of teams. It’s kind of who they are.”
And then they start banking in 3s?
No chance.
“A nice bounce back win,” said SDSU coach Brian Dutcher, whose team improved to 11-4 overall and 4-2 in the Mountain West. “It helped being back in front of our home crowd.”
It also helped getting a career night from Byrd, who had 25 points, six rebounds, one block and seven steals. Yes, seven. That’s the most by an SDSU player in a Mountain West game since Chase Tapley had seven in 2011. The school record in the Division I era is nine by Tracy Dildy in 1986.
Byrd became only the second player in the nation this year with at least 25 points and seven steals in a game, ing Long Beach State’s Devin Askew (whose head coach is former SDSU assistant Chris Acker).
“I love flying around defensively,” Byrd said. “That’s our identity here at San Diego State, and I’ve made that my identity as well. We work really hard every single day in practice. I feel like the past two years I’ve been a defensive guy, and I was glad I was able to show it, especially against a really good offensive team.”
Davis added 12 points, and Wayne McKinney III had nine (and the Aztecs were a team-high plus-15 points in his 18 minutes on the floor). Magoon Gwath had a solid night as well, with nine points, seven rebounds, a block and a steal in a career-best 29½ minutes.
Fellow freshman Pharaoh Compton would have had a big night if he could shoot free throws. He had eight points on 4 of 4 shooting but was 0 of 7 from the line and is now making just 35.5% of his freebies.
“I don’t worry about that going forward,” Dutcher said. “I think Pharaoh is a good free throw shooter. We just have to get his confidence up.”
The Rams (10-7, 4-2) became the first Aztecs opponent in four games to shoot over 40% (at 42.6%), but they had a season-high 20 turnovers and only two bench points (to 20 for SDSU). Star wing Nique Clifford, who was averaging 16.9 points and 9.9 rebounds, had a rough night: 11 points (on 5 of 16 shooting), six rebounds and five turnovers with Byrd as his primary defender.
“This one is fairly easy to digest,” Medved said. “You can’t turn the ball over 20 times against anybody, let alone San Diego State here in this place and give yourself a chance. We’ve been playing a lot better, but we turn the ball over. That’s something that we’ve addressed and talked about. Even in our wins, I told the guys if we don’t own that and clean it up, it’s going to come back and hurt us. And that is exactly what happened.
“Give them credit. That’s what they do. They’ve got length, athleticism, they anticipate. Some of that’s their good defense, but a lot of it is just sloppiness on our part.”
The first half went the way many others have this season.
The Aztecs struggle early, catch fire, take a lead, then struggle late.
It’s one of the confounding parts about this young team, losing focus for the final few minutes of the first half and letting teams back into the game. It happened most notably against Utah State, after the Aztecs had built an 18-point lead, then faltered and gave the Aggies a glimmer of hope they rode to a 67-66 win.
This time, they were up 32-23 after Byrd, who had 15 first-half points, turned a steal into a fast-break dunk that had the Viejas crowd in full voice. (Or as the March Madness twitter feed called him, Myles Bird.)
And then:
A layup by CSU’s Jaylen Crocker-Johnson after running over Byrd and the officiating crew swallowing its whistle, much to the consternation of Dutcher. An SDSU turnover. Two free throws by Crocker-Johnson following an offensive rebound. Two SDSU misses. A basket by Nique Clifford.
That trimmed the margin to 32-29, but this time there was a twist: Davis banked in a 3 at the buzzer to mitigate some of the damage and send the Aztecs into the locker room with a more positive glow.
That carried over into the second half, pushing the lead to double figures and then 17 after Byrd banked in a deeeeeep 3 and McKinney scored inside. With four minutes left, it was 20.
The Aztecs shot 44.6%, their best in six games and second best at home this season.
“Our coaches did a good job of emphasizing to us to play off two feet, being on balance,” Davis said. “We did a good job with our movement, not being so stagnant, having guys set screens constantly and keep the defense moving, allowing us to get good looks.”
Notable
Next up: Saturday at home against UNLV, with a rare 5 p.m. tip … “A moment of reflection” was held before the game for those affected by the Los Angeles fires … The Aztecs entered the night 2½ games behind New Mexico in the Mountain West standings. They ended it just 1½ games back after the Lobos lost 71-70 at San Jose State … After getting the same officials multiple times this season, the crew assigned to Tuesday night’s game was new faces: Mike Pearson, Rob Kueneman and Galen Durant …
In three of the last four years, CSU’s largest margin of defeat in a conference game has come against SDSU. All were at Viejas Arena (15 this season, 16 last year and 30 in 2022) … Former Mountain West player of the year Jamaal Franklin, taking a break from a successful overseas pro career and has attended several Aztecs away games this season, was sitting courtside and made his hands into a heart when introduced … Kimo Ferrari got minutes in both halves, making a 3 to elicit one of the night’s biggest roars.
