Key takeaways from Bulldogs’ loss in Mountain West basketball opener

Fresno State had all of its pieces back for the start of Mountain West play, the first time in five games that Jaron Hopkins was on the floor, Jahmel Taylor was able to come off the bench and the rotation looked as it did when putting up an average of 89.7 points in a sparkly three-game stretch.

And while it was expected to take time to fit everything just right, it wasn’t expected the Bulldogs would take a large step back.

But that is what happened in an 80-65 loss to Nevada on Wednesday at Save Mart Center, the Bulldogs struggling to get and make shots.

When coach Rodney Terry last had his rotation fully in place the Bulldogs had ripped up Long Beach State, putting up a season-high 106 points in a 36-point road win.

They bore little resemblance Wednesday and a good part of that was the Wolf Pack – their length and athleticism is not something they saw from Cal Poly or Weber State.

But the Bulldogs also didn’t react well to it.

“We didn’t have great ball movement tonight,” Terry said. “The ball stuck and you can’t have it stick against a switching defense and a team that has length that switches on defense. The ball has to move. You have to have player movement, have to have good pace and we didn’t have that from an offensive standpoint.”

The root of that is something the Bulldogs will have to solve, because a similar thing happened to them in the second half of a Dec. 16 loss to Oregon.

And while Fresno State had all of its pieces, it wasn’t all there at the offensive end. It was just … off.

They had no baskets in transition, nor any fast-break points. They shot poorly beyond the 3-point line. They turned the ball over.

Sam Bittner, who has made 25 baskets this season, with 21 beyond the 3-point line, scored his only field goal on a first-half drive.

Jahmel Taylor, fourth in the conference in 3-pointers made with 39 and sixth in 3-point percentage at 42.4, was just 2 of 8 there.

Hopkins played 22 minutes in his first game since suffering two transverse process fractures, hitting 1 of 4 shots in scoring five points with eight rebounds.

Two of those shots were 3-pointers and the other two jump shots, which is telling. There was nothing going to the rim, no drives, no layups.

“We knew he was going to come in and be a little rusty – he hadn’t played in three weeks,” Terry said. “The biggest thing I tried to emphasize to him was to keep the game simple. Come in and make simple plays, play really hard on defense, get lost on that end of the floor and let everything else just come to him.

“Any time you bring a new player back in to the fold, it is going to take some time to get back on the same page.”

In the two games before injuring his back after taking contact and a hard fall on a drive against Cal State Bakersfield, Hopkins had scored 29 points in a victory over Weber State – 18 on layups or dunks and another seven at the foul line – and 26 in the win at Long Beach State, with 16 at the rim and six at the line.

The 3-point shot? Not his forte. Hopkins had attempted five in his first nine games this season and was 9 of 37 (24.3 percent) last season.

“At the end of he day, we didn’t do what we practiced,” Terry said. “We knew going into this game that we had to have good ball movement, we had to share the basketball and we needed to try to play downhill. We weren’t able to do that, for whatever reason. Guys, the ball stuck in their hands, tried to do too much.

“Against a team like this you have to keep it simple. You have to make straight-line drives and you have to make decisive plays.”　

Thievery thwarted

Fresno State is leading the Mountain West in steals with eight per game, and that has been a big part of its game under Terry.

The Bulldogs led the conference the past three seasons and were second in 2014. The past two seasons they were tied for 12th and tied for ninth in the nation.

To go through 40 minutes of basketball without even one steal summed up fairly well what they brought to the game against Nevada, which obviously was not enough.

Records are incomplete, but Fresno State had not played a game without a steal since at least 2007-08. The last time it had one was Jan. 25, 2014, an overtime loss at UNLV.

“We have to play better defensively,” Terry said. “We didn’t play as good as we could have against a really good offensive team. We didn’t work the game for 40 minutes.”　

Reason to worry? Maybe not

Fresno State is 1-5 in its conference opener since joining the Mountain West, the victory coming in 2015-16 against UNLV.

It has started slowly just about every season …

▪ 2012-13: 1-4

▪ 2013-14: 1-4

▪ 2014-15: 4-1

▪ 2015-16: 3-2

▪ 2016-17: 2-3

But the Bulldogs, San Diego State and Boise State are the only programs in the Mountain West to play .500 basketball or better in conference in each of the past four seasons.

Fresno State was 11-7 last season, 13-5 in 2015-16, 10-8 in 2014-15 and 9-9 in 2013-14.

This story was originally published December 28, 2017 at 4:31 PM with the headline "Key takeaways from Bulldogs’ loss in Mountain West basketball opener."