A look back at the Boise State win/Utah State loss

Here's Shawn Harrison with a followup article on the Utah State loss to Boise State on Saturday. We're not attempting to be seen as a close relative to Little Mary Sunshine but the Aggie loss may actually be a good thing in the long run because Stew Morrill will use it as a motivational force during the remainder of conference play and for the tournament in Reno as sometimes you do run out of tools and kids can tune you out.

The down side: if Utah State doesn't win the WAC tourney then the loss will be harmful in getting an a Big Dance large bid.

It's also good to see that the Utah State fans aren't seeing the defeat as some sort of Don McLean-ish 'the day the music died' with the sky now falling. We've have thankfully yet to come across a "fire Stew now" comment or post.

Second-half magic wasn’t there for Ags
Shawn Harrison
Herald Journal
February 16, 2009

Having relied on strong second halves numerous times this season, it just wasn’t there Saturday night for Utah State.

The No. 21 Aggies (17th in the USA Today/ESPN poll) were only down two at the break against Western Athletic Conference rival Boise State. But unlike so many other games over the past two months, USU did not finish strong. It was the host Broncos who came out on fire.

BSU (17-7, 7-4 WAC) outscored the Aggies 14-4 during the first six minutes of the second half. With the home crowd behind them, the Broncos held off several USU (24-2, 12-1) rallies for a 66-56 win.

“A lot of times this year we have been down at half and relied on coming out in the second half and having a huge half,” Aggie guard Tyler Newbold said. “We came out and they went on a huge run to start the second half. After that we kind of played even the rest of the way.”

Which added up to something that hasn’t happened in the previous 19 games — defeat...

Go here for the remainder.