New Mexico basketball overwhelms Colorado State in second-half of Mountain West battle

[ad_1]

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The surge came and Colorado State had no answer.

With just shy of 13 minutes to go in Wednesday’s game at The Pit the Rams had a one-point lead.

The New Mexico men’s basketball team responded in force. The Lobos used the final 12 minutes to go on a monster push.

The team intro before games ends with “a mile high and louder than…” and fans yell “hell!” in response. That call-out comes from surges like this where the team and crowd feed energy into each other.

New Mexico took a tight game and turned it into a blowout final of 87-65 for the Lobos.

CSU led 50-49 with 12:51 to go and the Rams were outscored 38-15 the rest of the way.

Here are takeaways from the game.

Limited Kyan Evans costly for Colorado State

CSU’s shooting was way off-kilter save for one person: Kyan Evans.

The sophomore point guard looked composed offensively in the hostile environment and hit six of his first eight shots (for 14 points).

The problem? The whistle. Evans had two fouls at halftime, then picked up a hand-check for his third 18 seconds into the second half. Then his fourth foul came trying to draw a charge with 17:47 still left in the game.

“I thought he really came to play tonight. I thought he was really getting in the lane, he was creating, he was being aggressive,” CSU coach Niko Medved said. “I thought that really hurt our team and our rhythm.”

He had to sit for almost 10 minutes. It was 37-35 New Mexico when Evans left. The Rams briefly took a lead a couple times with him out, but New Mexico runs right when he went out and again before he came back saw the Lobo lead push to double-digits (64-54).

Evans returned with 8:25 to go but New Mexico had built its lead by then. Evans fouled out in the final seconds, ending with 15 points.

Colorado State stars struggle

It’s tough to win at New Mexico no matter what. A road win at The Pit requires big performance from the top players.

Nique Clifford was off-kilter with his shot, even missing a dunk in the first half. At one point Niko…

[ad_2]
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/mexico-basketball-overwhelms-colorado-state-054402405.html

Author : The Coloradoan

Publish date : 2025-02-06 05:44:00

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.