SDSU EXPANDS VALUE
Advancing to the Sweet 16, while being on CBS and the only game on, could help Aztecs with Power 5 suitors
Three thoughts on San Diego State beating College of Charleston and Furman in Orlando, Fla., to reach the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16 in the South Region:
1. Sweet success
Advancing to the Sweet 16 has a direct monetary benefit to the Mountain West conference and its membership from the increased tournament units over the next six years — or about $6 million total.
There are indirect benefits as well: sweatshirt sales at the bookstore, season tickets at Viejas Arena, a bump in donations, a rise in applications. And while Pac-12 Conference presidents aren’t sitting
around saying, “Let’s invite San Diego State if they beat Furman in Orlando,” the elevated profile and prestige associated with a Sweet 16 appearance can’t hurt the expansion cause.
“This is great exposure for our men’s basketball team, athletics and the institution as a whole,” SDSU Athletic Director John
David Wicker said. “Being the only game on yesterday in the early slot and on CBS was a major benefit.”
The real value, though, might be to the basketball program itself. It needs this.
SDSU has a dedicated practice arena, a 12,414-seat arena that is filled most nights, a loyal fan base in a metropolitan city. But it is not a college basketball blue blood. It doesn’t belong to a power conference (at least not yet). About half of its athletic department budget comes from public subsidies, student fees or private donations.
It gets four charter legs per season for road trips and crams into Southwest flights for the rest. It doesn’t have dedicated housing or a training table for basketball players like the big boys do. It has modest name, image and likeness resources — $2,000 per month instead of $10,000 or $15,000 (or more) elsewhere. Its head coach makes half or one-third of what he would in a power conference.
Instead, Brian Dutcher and his staff sell something else. They sell team. They sell family. They sell winning.
That pool of unselfish, supremely talented players is becoming increasingly shallow in the era of NIL, in the era of entitlement, in the era of me. Competition is fierce.
The Aztecs could always sell winning on a regional level, 20-win seasons, Mountain West titles,
regular trips to the NCAA Tournament. But no matter what happens against No. 1 overall seed Alabama on Friday in Louisville, Ky., the six days basking in the Sweet 16 sheen puts them in the national spotlight for the first time in nearly a decade. It validates and legitimizes them. It elevates them.
The timing is impeccable, coming two weeks after eight players were honored on senior night, coming just days after the transfer portal opened.
“There are a bunch of players at home right now watching the games on TV,” one college coach put it. “They’re all thinking, ‘I want to play for one of those 16 teams.’ ”
2. Bully Ball
Here’s what the head coaches of SDSU’s last five opponents said about the Aztecs:
Colorado State’s Niko Medved: “It’s a hard thing to sustain against a team like that, as athletic, as physical and really as deep as they are.”
San Jose State’s Tim Miles: “Their physicality really got us off-kilter.”
Utah State’s Ryan Odom: “They’re really physical … and they keep coming at you.”
College of Charleston’s Pat Kelsey: “We were getting our butts kicked physically in the first half, and we never do that. Ever.”
Furman’s Bob Richey: “They could advance as far as they want in this thing because of how physical they are.”
It is what defines this Aztecs program now: its togetherness, its experience, its athleticism but mostly its sheer physicality. San Diego, land of warm winters and chill attitude, has become an exponent of Bully Ball.
Credit the current coaches, but also a former one.
Jay Morris was an assistant coach and lead recruiter on Dutcher’s staff for three seasons before moving to USC in 2021. He was still with SDSU during the 2021 NCAA Tournament held in a bubble in Indianapolis, where teams were sequestered in downtown hotels and allowed to leave only for practice or games. Their meeting room was next to Baylor and Texas Tech’s, and seeing those players up close — seeing how imposing they were — left an immediate impression.
“I felt like for us wanting to win on that level, we needed to look somewhat comparable,” Morris said.
Then they went to Hinkle Fieldhouse for their game
against Syracuse. The starting five walked out for the opening tip … and looked up at the Syracuse players. That, Morris said, “solidified my thoughts.”
The Aztecs had just gone through a season where their biggest player on the floor at times was 6-foot-6. Within weeks, they had added pair of 6-9 transfers, 240pound muscled forward Jaedon LeDee from TCU and 225-pound center Tahirou Diabate from Portland. Then they got Matt Bradley from Cal, a 6-4 guard but built like a linebacker at 220 pounds.
They went to a recruiting event and targeted 6-8, 240pound Elijah Saunders, who would commit in the fall and arrive this season.
Now add 6-10, 230 Nathan Mensah, 6-6, 225 Aguek Arop and 6-3, 210 Adam Seiko returning for COVID seasons, and eight of 12 scholarship players are 6-6 or taller and nine tip the scales in the 200s.
It doesn’t guarantee a win against Alabama on Friday. It does mean when they walk on the floor for the opening tip, they’ll look somewhat comparable.
3. An off day
Utah State guard Steven Ashworth waved his arm and pointed to the smartwatch on his wrist. It tracks his sleep data, which he monitors closely during the season to ensure he has sufficient recovery after games.
He was talking after the Mountain West Tournament final on a Saturday afternoon. The Aggies had played the late semifinal
that tipped after 9 p.m. the night before and didn’t get back to the hotel until after midnight, then had to be back at UNLV’s Thomas & Mack Center 13 hours later to prepare for a 3 p.m. tip to accommodate the CBS telecast.
“You’re trying to get recovery,” Ashworth said. “I had to get in the ice bath (for) a few bumps and bruises after that semifinal game. I really tried to get to sleep as quick as I could. But if you’ve ever been an athlete, you understand how your body is just running after a game and how it can be hard to wind down.”
He looked at his watch. He got 4½ hours of sleep. And that was after playing two games in 27 hours beforehand, the full 40 minutes in one, 33 minutes in the other.
Three days later, Utah State was on a plane to the NCAA Tournament, where they faded after leading in the second half and lost 7665 against Missouri. The Aggies became the 12th straight team to lose in the tournament that reached the Mountain West championship and played three games in 40-odd hours, believed to be the tightest three-game window of any of Division I’s 32 conference tournaments.
SDSU broke that streak
a few hours later in Orlando against 12th-seeded College of Charleston, but it wasn’t easy. The Aztecs squandered a nine-point lead in the second half and hung on for an ugly 63-57 win, similar to the 62-57 slog between SDSU and Utah State in the Mountain West final in which the two teams combined to shoot 6 of 43 behind the 3-point arc.
Maybe the grueling conference tournament format has nothing to do with any of this. Or maybe it does, and the schedule should be adjusted to take Friday off after the semis if CBS insists on the 3 p.m. Saturday final.
Or maybe, in this era of supposed student-athlete welfare, we should just listen to Ashworth.
“I don’t know what the logistics would have to be,” the all-conference guard said. “Obviously, money rules everything. We understand that as athletes and entertainers. We appreciate the conference putting on such a high-class event. But for the betterment of the athletes and just the competition, I think it would be a positive thing, after the semifinal round, to have maybe a single day off to regroup and then have that final.”
Sounds reasonable.