Take three on Fresno State loss at Colorado State: freshmen (the wrong ones) dominate

Fresno State whiffed on a chance to string together back-to-back men’s basketball wins, absorbing an 86-68 loss Wednesday at Colorado State.

The Colorado State freshmen proved to be the difference.

Freshman David Roddy hit 11 of 17 shots for a game-high 26 points, and fellow freshman Isaiah Stevens shot 8 of 15 for 21 points to account for 54% of the Rams’ scoring.

In comparison, the Bulldogs freshmen (minus an injured Anthony Holland) didn’t have nearly as much success at the offensive end and failed to make much of an impact on the defensive end, too.

Fresno State (6-13, 2-6) is tied for the second-worst conference record in the Mountain West.

Here are three takeaways from Wednesday’s game …

AND THEN THERE WAS ONE

Holland hyper-extended his right elbow in practice Monday and became the latest in a long line of Bulldogs to miss a game with injury.

The 6-foot-5 guard was in his best stretch of the season, playing an average of 33.8 minutes over the past four games. In that run, Holland had career-highs of 12 points and four assists against San Jose State, a career-high nine rebounds at New Mexico and a career-high two blocked shots at Wyoming.

The Bulldogs now have just one player who has appeared in every game – freshman Orlando Robinson.

That does not compare favorably around the conference, which obviously plays into the Bulldogs’ lack of consistency.

The number of players to appear in every game …

Boise State – 8

Nevada – 8

Colorado State – 7

San Jose State – 7

San Diego State – 6

Wyoming – 6

Air Force – 5

Utah State – 5

UNLV – 4

New Mexico – 3

Fresno State – 1

Holland will be re-examined and undergo some tests Thursday after the Bulldogs return to Fresno after spending six days on the road. His status for Saturday when Boise State visits the Save Mart Center for a 5 p.m. game is to be determined.

FOUL CALL

Holland’s absence was not the only issue for coach Justin Hutson.

Robinson picked up a second foul at the 8:56 mark in the first half. It was not a good foul – reaching in on Rams forward Nico Carvacho 30 feet from the basket.

“He’ll learn from that,” Hutson said. “That’s Orlando. He does a lot of great things and he’s passionate. He’s competitive. He’ll learn from how that affected him and us.”

When Robinson picked up two quick fouls at Utah State and at San Diego State, he was glued to the bench for the remainder of the half. He got only three first-half minutes against the Aggies and five against the Aztecs.

But Hutson put him back in with 7:59 left against Colorado State. Robinson followed by picking up a third foul, forcing his way back to the bench a mere 76 seconds later.

Fresno State was leading 23-20 when Robinson was hit with his second foul and still ahead 24-23 when Hutson put him back in the game.

After Robinson picked up a third foul, the Bulldogs collapsed and went from trailing by three points to being down 46-33 at halftime.

Both fouls are learning experiences.

“I talked about that,” Hutson said. “It was a chance to put him back out there. We tried to get him out and get him back in and tell him not to foul. We said we were going to double team when his man got it so we could keep him out of foul trouble, but then sometimes silly fouls come.”

Senior New Williams also had two fouls in the first half, scoring four points with two rebounds in seven minutes. He sat for the final 13:20.

The only consistent source of offense the Bulldogs had on the floor was senior Nate Grimes, who matched a career-high 23 points.

Grimes attempted only two shots from the 3-point line in three games since returning from a wrist injury (he is playing with the wrist wrapped in tape), but was 4 of 8 on threes against the Rams.

“With New getting in foul trouble and O getting in foul trouble, they were out of the game for a while, and then we didn’t show a level of discipline that we needed to show,” Hutson said.

“I wish I would have doubled Roddy earlier, but if you double Roddy you’re leaving Carvacho on the backside and you’re leaving shooters out on three. It worked great for the first 11 minutes of the game. We had them taking tough twos. We didn’t jump. We didn’t foul. But they showed to be very good tonight. They were much better than we were tonight.”

QUICKNESS KILLS

The Bulldogs, down 13 at the half, cut the Colorado State lead to 55-49 with 12:50 to go.

That was the last time Fresno State made a push.

As the Rams started to pull away, the Bulldogs started to extend their defense, tried to get some pressure on the ball.

“Once we started pressuring, we extended and that’s what happens when you have those quick guards,” Hutson said. “We got extended and we missed a few rotations.”

Quite a few, actually.

Colorado State, which coming in had scored an average of 84.0 points in a four-game winning streak, hit 14 of its last 21 shots (66.7%).

Of those makes, eight came at the rim on layups and dunks.

The Rams ended up hitting 54% of their shots (34 of 63) while scoring at 1.344 points per possession. That is the highest for a team in a Mountain West Conference game this season – Nevada had a 1.330 in a 100-85 victory at Air Force.

This story was originally published January 22, 2020 at 10:36 PM.