Fresno State’s fast start to season hits reverse in homecourt loss to New Mexico

Fresno State’s biggest problem Saturday night wasn’t the zone defenses it had to deal with or any one player, though New Mexico guard Cullen Neal did hit 7 of 14 shots in putting up 26 points, 20 in the first half.

More than anything it was, in fact, the Bulldogs. With a chance to extend their best start in 10 years and win their first two conference games, they brought little to a matchup against the Lobos.

Fresno State was lacking everywhere in a 77-62 loss at Save Mart Center, playing in front of 6,881, the second-largest home crowd of the season.

“We said that to our guys probably about the eight-minute mark of the first half and as we got into halftime … the direct result of where we are right now is they are playing harder than we are,” coach Rodney Terry said. “That’s really hard for us to say because we take a lot of pride in how hard we play and how hard we compete when we come to the floor and they out-competed us in the first half.

“We have to get off the mat and guys have got to come back and respond. We have to have that every night. We’re going to have nights where we don’t shoot the ball well. We didn’t shoot the ball well (Saturday). But every night we have to have our effort, we have to have our defense. Defense travels. It stays with us at home. You can count on that every night and that’s something we have to have with us.”

They didn’t, certainly not in the first half. The Bulldogs did force 24 turnovers and had 16 steals, both season highs. But New Mexico, which improved to 2-0 in the Mountain West and 9-6 overall, still was very efficient.

The Lobos shot 53.2 percent and scored 1.027 points per possession including 1.158 in the first half.

Fresno State was at the other end of that equation, hitting 36.1 percent, including an unsightly 1 of 18 from three-point range, and scored 0.816 points per possession.

Terry said the Bulldogs let their offense affect their defense, but coming off a victory at UNLV in their conference opener, the lack of oomph at the start was a setback.

“The outcome was pretty disappointing,” senior point guard Cezar Guerrero said. “We knew this team was hungry for a win so we knew to expect their best punch. We didn’t take it well, is what happened. … We just have to respond well from these punches that we get in the beginning from these teams.

“We feel like we’re a Mountain West contender and we’re going to get everybody’s best shot no matter what. We just have to take the punches well and recover.”　　

Chasing Neal – The New Mexico guard hit 6 of 11 shots in the first half, 3 of 6 beyond the three-point line and 5 of 6 at the free-throw line. All six of those foul shots were the result of contact when attempting a three-pointer.

“From our end, we can’t foul him,” Guerrero said. “We can’t foul a three-point shooter and we have to get back on transition defense and not let easy baskets get to them.”

Terrell Carter had the first foul on Neal at the three-point line and Marvelle Harris had the second. Torren Jones also fouled Elijah Brown on a three-point shot.

“You can’t foul a jump shooter,” Terry said. “We knew we had two guys out there that we had to guard, that could shoot the basketball … being where you needed to be, contesting the shot, playing without fouling. If he makes a contested shot, we’ll live with that. But we can’t put him at the line and we did that. You can’t do that against a good team.”

Nowhere – New Mexico led for 39:03 of the 40 minutes, the score tied for the other 57 seconds. The Bulldogs never led and were down double digits for the first time at 17-7 just 7:03 into the game when Obij Aget scored on a dunk.

From that point, Fresno State played to a deficit of 10 or more points for all but 2:56.　

Zoned out – The Bulldogs were able to get the ball into the paint against the Lobos’ zone and had some good looks, but were not able to make shots.

That, Terry said, is where their problems started.

“I was surprised that we weren’t able to make and finish some of the plays that we had,” he said. “We got great looks at the start, and sometimes when you get off to that kind of start those plays deflate you a little bit. But they can’t deflate you to the point where you don’t get back and guard and try to defend on the other end, and we let that happen to us and it put us behind the eight ball and we were playing catch-up and in this league you can’t do that.

Et cetera – Harris led the Bulldogs with 15 points, going 5 of 19, including 1 of 8 beyond the three-point line. Julien Lewis and Cullen Russo added 12 points and Karachi Edo had 11 points and 11 rebounds.

▪ The Bulldogs’ poor shooting extended to the free-throw line, where they were 9 of 19 (47.4 percent). Over the past three games, they are 38 of 69 at the line (55.1 percent).

▪ Fresno State had 21 offensive rebounds, matching a season high first set against Pacific Union, and setting a season high against a Division I opponent. They had 18 offensive rebounds in a victory over Lamar and 17 three times. Fresno State had a 22-10 advantage in second-chance points.

▪ The 24 turnovers forced were the most for a Bulldogs D-I opponent since Dec. 11, 2010, when Pepperdine had 27 in losing 64-51 at Fresno State.

▪ The 16 steals were the most by the Bulldogs against a D-I team since they had 16 in an 88-83 overtime victory over New Mexico State on Feb. 3, 2011.

This story was originally published January 2, 2016 at 8:56 PM with the headline "Fresno State’s fast start to season hits reverse in homecourt loss to New Mexico."