Take three on Fresno State victory at Wyoming: Anthony Holland, and taking the ‘O’ out of Wyoming

Fresno State in its first six Mountain West men’s basketball lgames had played San Diego State twice, UNLV, New Mexico and Utah State.

The Aztecs, Rebels and Lobos started play on Saturday in the top three spots in the standings, a combined 16-3 in MW play, and the Aggies were the preseason pick to win the conference.

The Bulldogs landed in a much softer spot on Saturday and they took advantage of it with a 65-50 victory at Wyoming for their second Mountain West win.

Fresno State is now 6-12, 2-5 in the conference.

The Cowboys are 5-15 and 0-8.

Here are three takeaways from the game …

MALDONAD-O

Wyoming obviously is struggling, but it does have the third-leading scorer in the Mountain West in Hunter Maldonado.

The 6-foot-7 guard went into the game averaging a healthy 17.9 points per game, but for the most part was taken out of the Cowboys’ offense.

The Bulldogs spent some time playing zone, but coach Justin Hutson sent Anthony Holland after Maldonado at the start of the game and the freshman had an impact well beyond his two points and eight rebounds.

Maldonado scored just seven points. He did have eight rebounds and five assists, but the Cowboys had to look elsewhere for points and there are not a lot of credible threats elsewhere on the floor.

“Anthony Holland played on him most of the time,” Hutson said. “I think the zone confused him a little bit – he missed some shots that he usually makes. But we’re proud to come in here and hold them to 34%, 31% from three and turn them over 13 times. We were proud of our defense.”

Here are some notes on the Bulldogs’ defense …

▪ Maldonado had not scored less than 10 points in a game since he had nine in a victory over South Carolina on Dec. 5, 2018 –he played in only eight games last season, due to a back injury.

▪ He went into the game leading the Mountain West with 120 free throw attempts, getting to the line an average of 6.3 times per game, and was there only once against the Bulldogs, going 0 of 1.

▪ He was 3 of 11 shooting the basketball including 1 of 4 at the 3-point line, the 27.3% matching a season low.

▪ He also had an offensive rating of just 68.6 – he has been in triple-digits four times in MW play with a 110.5 against Air Force, 124.7 against New Mexico, 103.3 against UNLV and 112.0 at Nevada.

“He’s a very good player,” said senior forward Nate Grimes, who had seven points and 12 rebounds including seven at the offensive end. “He can shoot the ball, drive it. But Coach Hut made an emphasis on stopping him and we stopped him a little bit.

“Anthony played really well against him. Before the game we all got in the huddle and told him, ‘It’s go time. You have to prove to Coach Hut that you can guard one of the best scorers in the conference …’”

Holland had a plus-minus of plus-15 in the game, second-highest on the team to freshman guard Jarred Hyder at plus-16.

“Anthony is a competitor and he believes in himself,” Hutson said. “He fought, and it was a good team effort on helping, too. There were a couple of times where we switched out on him and guys did a great job on him.”

Wyoming in the game hit 19 of 55 shots, 34.5%, and at the end of the first half and start of the second it went more than 11 minutes without scoring. The Cowboys in that stretch were 0 of 9 and had eight turnovers.

Here is another notable stat from the Bulldogs victory …

Fresno State hit 18 of 25 free throws, while Wyoming was just 2 of 3 at the foul line. In the Bulldogs’ three Mountain West road games, their opponents had averaged 24 foul shots per game.

LEARNING ON THE JOB

Holland was not the only high-impact freshman in the Bulldogs’ victory. Orlando Robinson hit 6 of 8 shots in scoring 19 points with five rebounds, two assists, two blocked shots and three steals in 34 minutes.

Niven Hart also had an intriguing six points and three rebounds in 13 minutes off the bench, after missing the past four games due to injury. It was not the point total, but the way he went about it.

Early in the season if he got a touch, more times than not it was going up. Bad shot, good shot, any shot, Hart would take it.

‘I praised him for not shooting the first look that he had,” Hutson said. “We want him to be aggressive – he can score the ball. But we want it to be in a team setting.

“It’s a learning experience for him of when to be aggressive and when not to, and how to play. He has to want to do it and he did a good job of it. He shot the ones he was supposed to and drove the ones he was supposed to. We need to keep him doing that and he’ll be successful.”

ITINERARY

The Bulldogs have no charter travel in the budget this season so rather than return to Fresno they are taking a bus to Fort Collins, Colo, where they will stay until Wednesday when they play at Colorado State.

That is a lot of time between games to be cooped up in a hotel, even with practice time, film and study hall on the itinerary.

“It’s going to be a long, cold trip,” Grimes said. “It’s going to be fun, though. I hope we get to go see Bad Boys 3 tomorrow …

“We got a win, so we’ll see.”

This story was originally published January 18, 2020 at 8:29 PM.