Fresno State men’s basketball: Bulldogs let Spartans back in, but hold on for win

Fresno State was in a matchup Saturday against San Jose State, which is better than it has been in the past. But the Spartans still are painfully young and under development and not a forbidding threat in a conference where they won just one game the past two years.

But as they have at times, the Bulldogs had difficulty sustaining the positive, game to game and, in this case, half to half, putting themselves in tight quarters late in a contest that should not have been close.

Fresno State escaped with an 81-74 victory at Save Mart Center, improving to 12-6 overall and 3-2 in Mountain West Conference play. But the Bulldogs let a 19-point lead with 12:45 to play shrink to one twice against a team that shot 30 percent in the first half and didn’t have a lot going through the first part of the second half.

Coach Rodney Terry let the Bulldogs play through it and fix it, turning that run in reverse into a positive for a team that needs a reminder from time to time.

“I didn’t need to call a lot of timeouts,” he said. “There was no need to get up there and rant and rave. I have older players that understand … we’ve been through this. You have to play in the Mountain West for 40 minutes. It’s a long game. Whether you’re up, whether you’re down, you have to keep playing the game.

“Teams are going to make runs at you. It’s how you handle and withstand the runs and continue to play and continue to work the game, and I thought we did that.”

San Jose State, coming off a victory over Wyoming, only its second in a Mountain West game, put together a 17-2 run that grew to 26-8 to get back in it. Ryan Welage, one of three freshmen in the starting lineup, hit three from beyond the three-point line in that stretch for nine of his team-high 28 points. And the Spartans shot 52.8 percent in the second half after making only 9 of 30 shots in the first.

But Cezar Guerrero restored some semblance of order by sinking a three-pointer from the right corner with 5:48 to go, his only basket.

The senior point guard followed with a steal, and while that did not lead to points for the Bulldogs, it did kindle a 9-0 run that finished the Spartans (6-12, 1-5).

Marvelle Harris, the Preseason Player of the Year in the Mountain West, added on, pushing into the lane and getting to the free-throw line the next two times down the floor. A tough player for the Spartans to guard, Harris ended up with 32 points, making 9 of 14 shots and 12 of 15 free throws; the 15 foul shots were a career high.

“We didn’t want to start settling when they went on a run,” he said. “We wanted to get to the line or get to the basket and try to get an easy shot in the paint.”

The Bulldogs basically got back to what built that double-digit lead: defending, rebounding, taking advantage of their physical advantages. Fresno State got to the free-throw line 46 times, making 35, more than double the number of foul shots attempted by the Spartans, who were 8 of 15.

Forward Torren Jones, back in the starting lineup after coming off the bench in the past two games, had his fifth double double and first since a Nov. 30 loss at Oregon, scoring 11 points with 13 rebounds, seven at the offensive end. Paul Watson added 10 points and four rebounds, and Harris added six rebounds and three assists.

That the Bulldogs were in a one-point game with six minutes to go was a bit troubling. In an 85-63 victory over Nevada on Jan. 6, Fresno State faced no such threat, pushing a 17-point halftime lead to 27 and cruising the rest of the way. But the Bulldogs responded favorably, getting a game they needed with three of the next four on the road starting Tuesday at San Diego State.

“We did a really good job in the Nevada game, but it’s really hard,” Terry said. “You look around the country playing with a lead, Boise was up 21 on us with 15 to go. There’s no team in our league that’s going to quit playing. You have to continue to battle and continue to do what got you the lead.

“We hit a stretch where we weren’t scoring as much and hit a lull there, and I said to our guys, ‘Anytime we have a lull, that just means we have to rev it up on defense so we can get back to what helped us get that lead.’ ”

This story was originally published January 16, 2016 at 6:36 PM with the headline "Fresno State men’s basketball: Bulldogs let Spartans back in, but hold on for win."