SAN DIEGO — It was gutty and gritty, rarely pretty, but the San Diego State Aztecs put together a furious second half rally to top the San José State Spartans 71-68 on Tuesday night at Viejas Arena.
Magoon Gwath followed up his Freshman of the Week performance with 24 points and seven rebounds, Miles Byrd scored all 13 of his points in the second half and Nick Boyd had 11 points, nine rebounds and five assists as the Aztecs (14-5, 7-3 Mountain West Conference) closed the game scoring 21 of the final 27 points.
"When they got ahead early, it was a lot like Air Force, we tried to go too fast," said head coach Brian Dutcher. "As we settled in, started running a little bit more offense, sharing the ball, moving it a little bit more we found opportunities to score."
After trailing by as much as 21 points in the first half, the Scarlet and Black comeback equaled the second-largest comeback for SDSU since at least the 1996-97 season. The last time it happened was the 62-52 overtime win over UNLV on March 8, 2017 when the Aztecs trailed by 21 with 18:25 to go in the second half.
With regular starter Jared Coleman-Jones not dressed to play for the game the Aztecs leaned heavily on Gwath and Miles Heide. The freshman played a career high 34 minutes, while Heide also had a career best 27 minutes and finished tied with Boyd for a game tops plus-8 in addition to grabbing a couple key late rebounds and providing a tough inside presence.
"I've stayed locked in longer in practice and that's helped carry over for the games," Gwath said. "I was really just trying to focus on one possession at a time. I had a couple of bad plays at the start of the game, got a little frustrated, and I was just thinking 'next play, next play, next play.'"
SDSU was behind by 16 points in the second half twice, the last time being when Latrell Davis made a pair of free throws at 12:22. A Wayne McKinney III drive and score kicked off a brief 6-0 spurt, but the big run for the Scarlet and Black came after the Davis 3-pointer at the 9:18 mark that gave SJSU (10-12, 3-7) a 62-50 lead.
Byrd scored his first bucket of the game on a paint jumper after attempting just one shot in the first half. After being challenged at half time by the coaches, that make got the sharpshooter from Stockton going, as he hit four of his next five shots.
"I thought the second half he moved it better and it found its way back to him," Dutcher said. "He's got to know that defender are keying on him, so he can't score every time he gets it, he has to be an assist guy, which he was at Nevada...he's shown that he's growing his game and that's what I want to see."
BJ Davis scored a tough up-underneath layup, which started a 18-0 run that saw Boyd nail a triple and Byrd make a pair from downtown — his depth charge from the left wing with just over five minutes left gave the Aztecs their first lead of the game since the opening minutes, which they would hold onto the rest of the way.
A Spartan timeout couldn’t stem the tide, as Boyd drove and scored an and-one and Gwath hit a layup before Josh Uduje hit a 3 with 2:08 to play and SDSU leading 68-65. Byrd iced it with a driving baseline up-under reverse layup and Heide made a free throw for the final Aztec point.
San José State made 15 of 31 3-pointers in the game, led by 23 points off the bench from Davis on 5 of 7 shooting from downtown while Uduje had 21 points and made 5 of 9 3-pointers. The 15 makes from beyond were the most allowed by the Aztecs since Syracuse hit 15 in the First Round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament.
Dutcher said the team started the game hedging on ball screens expecting the SJSU players to drive, but Uduje made three early 3's and the Aztecs decided to change to switching on ball screens at the players' suggestion.
"At the end we just went drop defense, so we tried to play three different defenses, but we knew (Uduje) was rolling.
Uduje came out hot for SJSU, scoring 16 of their first 19 points and making 4 of 6 from beyond the arc. His hot touch from downtown was contagious, as the Spartans made 9 of their 16 3-point attempts in the opening half.
After a Taj DeGourville to Pharaoh Compton alley-oop, the Aztec offense came undone with eight turnovers over a 7:26 scoreless stretch in the middle of the half. There was a stretch where SDSU was unable to attempt a shot for over four minutes because they had turnovers on seven straight possessions.
Even the dance team was out of sync, as the third media break of the half came early at 8:30 when Dutcher called his second timeout of the half, so the group didn’t perform on the court in the first half.
It wasn’t until DeGourville made a left wing jumper curling around a screen at 7:23 that the Scarlet and Black offense shook to life. After a Chol Marial 3 extended the Spartan lead to 33-12, Gwath kick-started an 11-0 run with an alley-oop jam from DeGourville, a steal and slam and then a left wing 3-ball.
"Us just being able to take those punches and go back and execute on the offensive end, that's pretty big for us and shows growth," Byrd said.
SDSU closed within 10 points on a Boyd layup with 3:31 before the break, but Davis the final five of his 15 first half points to give SJSU a 41-29 lead at the break.
Coleman-Jones' status is to be determined going forward due to a shoulder issue. Before leaving the postgame interview table, Byrd made sure to acknowledge Heide's performance stepping into the starting role in place of Coleman-Jones.
"I'm proud of the way (Heide) played today," Byrd said. "He's really moving well right now, he feels good...he's just that sparkler off the bench, he's a great offensive rebounder, and even when he doesn't get that offensive rebound he gets a hand on it and gives somebody else an opportunity to go get an offensive rebound."
San Diego State continues their two-game homestand against Wyoming at 5 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 1 at Viejas Arena, then will have their bye and be off for seven days until they face Colorado State in Fort Collins on Feb. 8.
This story was updated at 11:16 p.m.