Clifford, Rams rebound from Wyoming loss with kickball

FORT COLLINS — For socalled roadkill, Nique Clifford kicked some serious tail Tuesday night.

Thank the kickball.

Yes, kickball. A bunch of college dudes and their coaches playing like fifth-graders again.

“We got rid of (our last game),” Clifford explained after dropping 20 points in a 79-71 win over San Diego State. “We went and played kickball. We had some fun. Got back to being who we are … that got us closer together.”

If there was ever a moment and a team that required flushing, it was the 16-5 Rams.

After Saturday’s soul-killing loss at woebegone Wyoming this past weekend, social media declared them dead. Some Foco faithful started calling for heads to roll and whispering the winter’s dirtiest 3-letter word: N-I-T.

“You don’t go in and try to shame these (players) for what they did,” CSU coach Niko Medved explained. “They know.

“I just decided (on Sunday), ‘We’re not going to spend one minute getting ready for SDSU.’ It’s 62 degrees in FORT Collins, let’s go out and play some kickball.”

Flushing accomplished.

Team Roadkill outscored one of the most physical teams in the country in the paint 30-22. They won the fast-break point count by a margin of 18-12. They turned it over just 10 times.

NIT? Come on. Are the Rammies flawed? Yeah. CSU still feels like a David Roddy team without David Roddy, which isn’t fair, but that’s the bar.

Fair to worry about how this team closes? Sure. The Rammies made just six of their final 10 free-throw attempts Tuesday in friendly confines, makes that would’ve put this one to bed a lot sooner. Coming off missing three out of five from the stripe in the last 3:31 of regulation in Laramie, the wrong kinds of patterns form.

Fair to panic? Nah.

“As good of a win as we’ve had,” Medved said. “Just couldn’t be prouder of this group of young men.”