People love crushing Spokane. It's not Seattle. It's stuck in the rural and eastern parts of the state. The downtown is aging, and the economy is suffering. The weather on Sunday was overcast with a light drizzle after snowfall in the morning. It's a lot blurry.
It's not San Diego.
San Diego State? Absolutely loves the place.
The Aztecs stumbled through a season filled with high expectations, losing 10 times, changing the starting lineup in February, shuffling the rotation, wasting late leads, collapsing in crunch time, fouling shots, finishing fifth in the Mountain West, and losing in the conference tournament. last.
Except for Lilac City. They're the 1975-76 Indiana Hoosiers here, and the 88-0 UCLA Bruins here.
San Diego State players celebrate guard P.J. Davis' 3-pointer against Yale.
(Meg McLaughlin/San Diego Union-Tribune)
85-57 Destruction 13yTop-seeded Yale Sunday night at Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena was just the latest example, sending the fifth-seeded Aztecs to the Sweet 16 in the NCAA Tournament for the fourth time in school history and the second year in a row to face the overall No. 1 seed — Thursday in Boston vs. Connecticut at 4:39 pm PDT on TBS.
No doubt the Huskies saw the score, saw the bracket and thought: “Those guys? Again?”
It's a rematch of last year's championship game 72,423 ago at NRG Stadium in Houston, which the Huskies won 76-59 but only after the Aztecs' lead had been cut to a tense five points with five minutes left.
“We're very excited to play them again,” said Darrion Trammell, one of two Aztecs players returning from the game. “Obviously they won the national championship last year, but I feel like we've been there. Just to get another chance, I think we're ready to take that chance.”
“We have a team to do this.”
The last time the Aztecs were here on the opening weekend of the NCAA Tournament, in 2014, they won two games and headed to the Sweet 16. There's also Gonzaga's 2-1 record at an on-campus venue where the Bulldogs have almost never lost, including That included their 84-74 win on Dec. 29, in which they led by 15 points midway through the second half.
Three months later, in the same city, they drove 23… In the first half.
It mostly went like this:
Trammell drained a layup 3, was fouled, and made the free throw for a four-point play. The Bulldogs went to the other end, and August Mahoney threw a bounce pass to Matt Knowling…it went between his legs and out of bounds.
Yale did what most No. 13 seeds do after being eliminated from the No. 4 spot in the opening round, exploded with emotion for the biggest win in school history, and then had nothing left two days later against a tough, physical, experienced, hands-on team. It churned through them like a wheat harvest in the Palouse.
That's eight straight losses for a No. 13 seed in the second round to a No. 5 seed and 3-18 since the tournament expanded to a 64-team bracket in 1985. In the exact same situation a year ago in Orlando, the Aztecs are on a 13-win streak.y– Furman is seeded by 23 points after the Paladins' win over Virginia.
Yale is on spring break and the University of Idaho band was wearing blue T-shirts with the letter Y on them as imposters. Maybe the Ivy League Tournament champions fielded a rogue team, too.
Now combine that with the Aztecs' best performance of the season.
The team that entered today ranked 306thy In 3-point accuracy of 362 by Division I programs, he made a season-high 13 on 27 attempts (48.1 percent). Jaydon Leddy was 2 of 2. Myles Byrd was 3 of 3. Elijah Saunders and Lamont Butler were 2 of 3. Trammell was 4 of 7.
San Diego State forward Jaydon Leddy (13) dunks against Yale forward Danny Wolfe (1).
(Meg McLaughlin/San Diego Union-Tribune)
“I told the guys in the locker room (at halftime), ‘Well, they can’t shoot 7-of-15 in the second half,’ so they came out and shot 6-of-12,” Yale coach James Jones said. “…They got hot and felt good, got comfortable, and were able to shoot.” And that's what happens, when you have a comfort level, you make it, and every Tom, Dick and Harry that comes off the bench, they make it, too.
“We encountered a buzz saw.”
Liddy was more succinct: “I think it's just March.”
LeDee had 17 points in the first half and was substituted with 8:40 left, and he got his job done for the night, with 26 points (on just 12 shots) and nine rebounds after 32 and eight in Friday's four-point win over UAB. Trammell, who was hot this time last year, had 18 points on just eight shots to go along with four assists and three steals in easily his best game of his season.
Saunders added eight points off the bench but more importantly drew the defensive assignment for Yale's 7-foot center Danny Wolf, who finished with nine points on 2-of-8 shooting.
Butler drew John Poulakidas, who had 28 against Auburn and nine on 2-of-9 shooting with the Mountain West Defensive Player of the Year in his shorts. He also surpassed 1,000 points in his career.
If all this sounds familiar – shine in the first match of the tournament, play for free and win big in the second – it is.
“I think we just came out of the toughest game,” Trammell said. “The first game is definitely always the toughest. I feel like getting that first game under our belt, where we come out of it a little looser and a little more confident. … There's no reason to go out there and hesitate. So I think we'll let the travel go tonight.”
Maybe all the Aztecs (26-10) needed to do was breathe some cold, humid air in the Northwest to solve their problem with slow starts.
They came here having trailed after five minutes in 13 of their previous 14 matches. Now they are back to back with the lead.
Friday was a modest 10-7. Saturday was an even more emphatic 13-3 thanks to 3 of 5 shots behind the arc, one by Butler on a pass from LeDee and two by LeDee when the Bulldogs backed him into the paint.
When Jones called timeout with 8:13 remaining in the first half, LeDee was up to 15 points after back-to-back layups on feeds from Bird. Normally, LeDee gets rested midway through the first half, but he was feeling it and had no fouls, and Dutcher let him ride.
San Diego State forward Elijah Saunders (25) celebrates after a dunk.
(Meg McLaughlin/San Diego Union-Tribune)
And his teammates were just getting started. The Bulldogs narrowed it down to five, and the Aztecs hit the throttle for an 11-0 run.
The Bulldogs scored two baskets, and the Aztecs outscored them 8-0 and the score was 45-21 at halftime (which would have been 47-21 if Micah Parrish hadn't missed a layup at the buzzer).
Then Trammell hit a pair of 3s early in the second half, and the lead was 29.
How sweet…
This year marks San Diego State's fourth appearance in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament. Here's a look at how they got there and what happened.
2011
No. 2 seed San Diego State beat 15th-seeded Northern Colorado 68-50 in the first round and seventh-seeded Temple 71-64 in double overtime.
And then… UConn defeated third-seeded SDSU 74-67 in the Sweet 16 in Anaheim.
2014
The No. 4-seeded Aztecs beat No. 13 New Mexico State 73-69 in overtime in the first round and No. 12 North Dakota 63-44 in the second round.
And then… Arizona defeated top-seeded SDSU 70-64 in Anaheim.
2023
Seeded No. 5, SDSU beat 12th-seeded College of Charleston 63-57 in the first round and 13th-seeded Furman 75-52 in the second round.
And then…the Aztecs traveled to Louisville and upset top-seeded Alabama in the Sweet 16, 71-64.
2024
No. 5 seed San Diego State beat 12th-seeded UAB 69-65 in the first round and 13th-seeded Yale in the second round.
And then… SDSU will face top-seeded UConn on Thursday in Boston.
Bird then hit a 3 from the left wing to make it 30.
He crossed the field and headed toward the SDSU fans. And smile.
It was the largest margin of victory in the NCAA Tournament in school history, the largest halftime lead, the most points scored and the most 3-pointers made. The 24-point halftime margin was Yale's largest in a decade.
“Our guys fought back,” Jones said of his Bulldogs. “It wasn't our day. I told them in the crowd (afterward), that basketball gives you lessons in life and the lesson we learned today is that everything is not going to be sunshine and roses for you.”
“You'll get a sandwich that you don't want to eat sometimes, and we had to eat that sandwich. It doesn't taste good.”
NB
The SDSU travel group, which includes the team, administrators, boosters, cheerleading squad and band, was scheduled to return home via a charter provided by the NCAA a few hours after the game. Departure from Spokane was scheduled for 12:45 a.m. with arrival in San Diego at 3:26 a.m., meaning they would not arrive on campus much before 4 a.m. There was some thought about flying directly to Boston, but they made plans to return home before learning they had a tip-off late Sunday night. “It's worth it to sleep a couple of nights in your own bed,” Dutcher said. They will travel to Boston on Tuesday…
SDSU did not trail, only the second time that has happened in an NCAA Tournament game. The other, in 2014 against New Mexico State, was also in Spokane… SDSU is one of seven programs in consecutive Sweet 16s. Alabama, Gonzaga, UConn, Creighton, Houston and Tennessee are the others… The game was scheduled to end at 6:40 p.m. but didn't end until 7:13 because Alabama-Grand Canyon was delayed… Sunday the former SDSU coach Steve FisherQ 79y Birthday… Officials: Ronald Grover (Administrative Coordination Committee), Matt Potter (Big East, Atlantic 10) and Paul Silk, which plays West Coast games and SDSU has worked against Nevada and Stanford this season, both winning. Groover is ranked No. 7 in the Kenpom Reference Rankings, Szelc No. 15 and Potter No. 40.
“Student. Incurable problem solver. Amateur baconaholic. Introvert. Infuriatingly humble music fanatic.”