After the Wyoming Cowboys’ three point loss on the road at the undefeated Utah State Aggies that saw a last second half court heave by senior wing Jordan Nesbitt draw the front of the rim and just fall short of pushing the game to overtime, it’s safe to say that the Cowboys will not be an easy out in the Mountain West.
The aforementioned undefeated Aggies–who moved to 8-0 on the season after escaping the Cowboys on their home court–learned first hand just how tough this Cowboys team is. Sundance Wicks, who roamed the sidelines as the headman in his first Mountain West regular season matchup, knew his team had to play to their strengths if they had any shot of taking down the Aggies on the road.
That meant slowing the offensive pace of this one down to a crawl. That meant playing hard-nosed on the defensive end. That meant turning this one into one of Wicks’ most coveted terms: a “rock fight.”
“They executed,” Wicks said of his squad. “To me, that was the biggest thing tonight that I took away. They didn’t hurry up, they didn’t try and force bad shots early in the shot clock. We worked the possession. We got three shot clock violations, which I told them we’re fine with.”
If the Cowboys executed their game plan just how their coach wanted to, then what proved to be the difference that gave the Aggies a three point edge when the horn sounded at the end of the contest?
That easily would be the effort by the Aggies’ two most prominent players, Ian Martinez and Mason Falslev, who finished with 23 and 19 points, respectively. Wicks knew it would be difficult to stop the Aggies’ leading scorer tandem of Martinez and Falslev, but was keen on making the night difficult for the pair.
“Martinez and Falslev are extremely dynamic, I’ve watched enough games on them to know, those guys, nobody shuts their water off, right? So, you got to make it a long night for them,” Wicks said before the contest.
THAT'S WHY THEY CALL HIM THE MAYOR‼️@mason_falslev #AggiesAllTheWay pic.twitter.com/fJlIwnaHxf
— USU Men's Hoops (@USUBasketball) December 5, 2024
While the pair ended up scoring well over half the points for the Aggies, it certainly didn’t come easy. The Pokes held Falslev–who entered the contest shooting over 50% from three–scoreless from beyond the arc. They also held Martinez to just 6/15 from the field, but the senior guard made all eight of his attempts from the charity stripe.
In fact, the free throw disparity in the contest ended up becoming a major storyline within this one, as the Aggies were granted 17 more attempts from the free throw line when compared to the amount of free throw attempts the Cowboys were allotted in the contest.
Another margin that proved to be costly for the Cowboys was on the glass. The Cowboys were outrebounded 35-27 in the contest and gave up a total of 10 offensive rebounds, many of which proved to be costly in a game with such a razor-thin margin of victory for the Aggies.
“Had a couple bad breaks there with the ball, Falslev crosses over the free throw line and gets his own rebound and kicks out for a three, which we all know you can’t chase your own rebound from the free throw line,” Wicks recounted of one costly mistake.
“There were little paper cuts there at the end that I thought we could have done a better job with, but ultimately, it was a make or miss game, we put ourselves in a position to win a quad one game on the road [which is] not easy to do.”
The Cowboys were again led by Obi Agbim, who finished with a double-double including 17 points and 10 assists.
“He ran us, he got us into everything that we needed to get into tonight,” Wicks said of Agbim. “It was a growth game for him.”
Kobe Newton matched Agbim with 17 points, as he finished his night shooting 5/10 from beyond the arc despite being harassed by the Aggies’ student section for opening the game with an airball. Nesbitt finished his night with 13 points and nine rebounds, but did have six turnovers. Dontaie Allen, who had been struggling, shooting under 19% from the field entering the game, provided a nice spark off the bench, hitting three triples for nine points.
Back & forth all day.@KingKobe360 with some style. pic.twitter.com/n8dt2aAzr9
— Wyoming Cowboy Basketball (@wyo_mbb) December 5, 2024
The Cowboys, who moved to 5-3 after the loss, will remain on the road in their next contest, searching for their first road win of the season when they travel up to South Dakota to take on the South Dakota Coyotes on December 10.
