Will shutdown and canceled game at Air Force leave Bulldogs at a loss?

Fresno State didn’t get a chance to play basketball on Saturday, its game at Air Force shuttered by the government shutdown.

All non-essential personnel at the Academy weren’t allowed to go to work, which includes many of the Falcons’ coaches, training and support staff.

But keeping a routine matters and a rhythm can come into play during a basketball season, and that lost game could be essential to the Bulldogs.

They play UNLV on Tuesday at the Save Mart Center having won two games in a row and three of their past four, but it will be seven days since they came from 10 down in the second half to win at San Diego State.

When Fresno State has had more than five days between games against Division I opponents the results over the past four-plus seasons have not been all that favorable.

The Bulldogs are 5-9 including a loss this season to Nevada, for a .357 winning percentage. In their other 135 games against D-I teams, they are 80-55, a .593 winning percentage.

Five of those nine losses have come in conference play.

That might be a problem if not for a fairly rough week for the Bulldogs, who once again had a few issues away from home.

If they had the four charter flights they have had available in the past, the return trip from Air Force might have been a candidate to use one given the Tuesday date with UNLV. But with a 2 p.m. (MT) game, there was enough time afterward to bus 90 minutes back to Denver, catch a commercial flight to Fresno and be home in plenty of time for the players to get some rest, for the coaches to get into their prep for UNLV.

One thing, though ...

The Bulldogs got stuck in the airport through a two-hour delay because their scheduled flight didn’t have a flight crew, and they had to wait for one to fly in.

That, after traveling to the game at San Diego State without Jaron Hopkins and Jahmel Taylor, who had not been admitted to grad school before the start of the spring semester. Hopkins and Taylor, by the way, both are Fresno State graduates and both were on the Mountain West all-academic team last spring.

There was an early flight back to Fresno and the next day a late flight to Denver and bus ride to Colorado Springs.

Not playing a taxing game at Air Force might actually help the Bulldogs.

“It was a long two days,” coach Rodney Terry said after practice Sunday. “ Travel is really difficult in our league, especially if you’re depending on commercial flights to get you where you need to get to. What we had to do was tough.

“We were a little tired, so I’m OK with it. I don’t think it’s going to hurt us. We came in (Sunday) and had good pop. I think we did the smart thing by not doing anything (Saturday) because of the two previous days that we had.”

The unscheduled break before playing the Rebels will be the third extended layoff for Fresno State, which has eight days between games next month against San Diego State and at San Jose State, and seven between its final regular-season games against Wyoming and at New Mexico.

With the government shutdown ending, a game could be squeezed into one of those two stretches for the Bulldogs and Falcons.

The numbers

UNLV: 14-5, 3-3 in the MW.

Fresno State: 14-6, 4-3.

The line: Bulldogs -4.

Go figure

In Mountain West play the Rebels have more assists, rebounds and offensive rebounds and have fewer turnovers at home than when on the road.

Yet, they are 3-0 on the road and 0-3 at home.

The difference – and this probably makes even less sense – is UNLV has shot the basketball much better when away from home than it has at the Thomas & Mack Center, on both its 2-point and 3-point shots.

Road: 82 of 160 (51.3), 22 of 44 (.50.0).

Home: 88 of 195 (45.1), 14 of 58 (24.1).

The Rebels’ Shakur Juiston is leading the Mountain West in field-goal percentage (64.6 percent) and Brandon McCoy is third (60.5) – they have shot it well everywhere.

But there are some stark differences, home and road on that roster.

Kris Clyburn: home, 7 of 28, 25.0; road, 12 of 22, 54.5.

Jovan Mooring: home, 10 of 39, 25.6; road, 11 of 26, 42.3.

Minutes watch

Terry said there could be more minutes for sophomore forward Nate Grimes.

In the win at San Diego State, Grimes navigated through the Aztecs’ zone well, scoring three easy baskets at the rim and assisting on a make by Bryson Williams.

Grimes, who came off the bench and played starter minutes (15) in the second half of that game, hit all seven of his shots in scoring a career-high 15 points.

“Nate is earning his keep right now,” Terry said. “A lot of it depends on the matchups with him. He would have played probably more minutes than he played in the first Air Force game because he’s getting better with concepts and doing different things.

“He’s a really good matchup with certain lineups. But he has grown a lot as a player, for sure, and you’re getting to a point where you trust him on offense, too. That was a big hurdle. But he’s three years in, and he has gotten better.”

This story was originally published January 22, 2018 at 4:10 PM with the headline "Will shutdown and canceled game at Air Force leave Bulldogs at a loss?."