SAN DIEGO _ San Diego State had clinched at least a share of the Mountain West regular season title _ its seventh in the conference's 21-year history _ midway through the first half of Tuesday night's game against New Mexico after Utah State held on to win at Colorado State.
Mountain West Commissioner Craig Thompson was in Viejas Arena to present the trophy in a postgame ceremony on the floor.
Scissors and a ladder were ready to cut down nets.
Red and white confetti was ready to tumble from the heavens.
And ...
The only way it would happen was if the Aztecs beat the Lobos, even though they'd still clinch the title with a loss. No win, no ceremony. When you're 24-0 and ranked fourth and a projected 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament, you're not backing into anything.
So they won. Again.
The 82-59 win pushed the Aztecs to 25-0 overall and 14-0 in the Mountain West, giving them a five-game lead over four teams each with five losses. Students rushed the floor. Thompson handed coach Brian Dutcher the trophy. The ladder and scissors were brought out (even university President Adela de la Torre snipped off a strand of nylon). Confetti fell. Another banner will hang from the Viejas rafters next season.
"The rich tradition of San Diego State basketball continues tonight," Thompson said. "You look up at all the banners, but this team is special. History is set from here on out. Twenty-five consecutive wins ..."
The Aztecs got 22 points and 12 rebounds from Matt Mitchell on the night when he became the 34th player in school history to reach 1,000 points for his career. That included maybe the dunk of the season _ a flying, one-handed jam on the break over a poor, posterized New Mexico defender that sent Viejas into full throat and put the exclamation point on the second-half avalanche.
Yanni Wetzell equaled his Division I career high with 20 points on 7-of-9 shooting. Malachi Flynn had 15 points after missing eight of his first nine shots, and Jordan Schakel added 11.
New Mexico (17-9, 6-7) got a career-high 20 points from Vante Hendrix, but no one else scored in double figures. Vance Jackson, who had 20 points three nights earlier against Wyoming, went scoreless for most of the game and finished with six. The Lobos shot 35.4% overall, and just 26.5 in the second half.
When these teams met 13 days earlier in Albuquerque, the Aztecs played what Lobos coach Paul Weir called "the most impressive three minutes I've ever gone against in my four years as a head coach."
It wasn't 17-0 this time.
That's because while the New Mexico uniforms were the same, the players in them weren't. The Lobos were missing four starters in the first game. Tuesday night, they were missing only two after the return of Jackson from injury and JaQuan Lyle from a two-game suspension, one game, presumably, for each gunshot wound at the party he hosted at an off-campus home rental that turned ugly at 2 a.m.
The Lobos won the opening tip and Makuach Maluach quickly drained a 3 from the left corner.
SDSU wouldn't take its first lead until 8:51 left in the first half, the latest it's gone in 14 conference games before being ahead.
How come? The Aztecs missed 12 of their first 16 shots and had eight turnovers at intermission, two more than in the entire game at Air Force on Saturday (and eight more than in the second half). Adam Seiko entered the day with four turnovers all season ... and had three at the half, all for stepping out of bounds in the corner.
Another problem: Schakel, Mitchell and KJ Feagin all were in foul trouble. Feagin picked up one early, returned to the game with 14:17 left in the half, then got another six seconds later.
Then Mitchell got his third 65 seconds into the second half.
Dutcher gambled and left him in, and Mitchell responded with SDSU's next two hoops. On their next possession, he fired an assist to the left corner for a 3 by Schakel, and the Aztecs led by 10.
The Lobos made a mini-run, powered by a banked-in 3 by Lyle, but Schakel pushed the margin to 11 and forced a Weir timeout on a 3 off a blind, over-the-head pass from Feagin.
The game had an edge to it, and not just because the commissioner was in the house with a trophy or because the 28-point loss the Aztecs handed the Lobos was the fourth most-lopsided loss in the history of The Pit.
"The Show" student section displayed blown-up police mug shots of three New Mexico players: Carlton Bragg for a recent DWI, Lyle for public intoxication shortly after he left Ohio State and J.J. Caldwell for an arrest while at Texas A&M.
That fired up the Lobos, so much that guard Keith McGee animatedly pointed to the SDSU bench and then to "The Show" in the huddle before tip-off and said: "(Screw) them, and (screw) them."
Less than three minutes into the game, New Mexico forward Corey Manigault threw down a two-handed dunk on the break, then got a technical foul for taunting.
With six minutes left, Manigault and Schakel were jawing at each other after Schakel fouled him. Referee Mike Reed told Weir to get Manigault out, and Weir sent a sub to the scorer's table. Manigault made the first free throw, then missed the second _ meaning there was no chance to sub.
Manigault kept talking, and Reed T'd him up as Flynn dribbled up court. That was his second technical. Manigault walked straight past the Lobos bench to the locker room.
