Utah State ends UNM’s home win streak with dominant victory in The Pit

The team everyone expected to compete for a Mountain West championship this season looked the part.

The team nobody thought would be in the hunt, well, they weren't on Wednesday night.

The veteran-laden Utah State Aggies outshot, outrebounded, outdefended, and outclassed UNM in an 86-66 win in front of an announced Pit crowd of 14,419 — snapping the Lobos' 23-game home win streak.

"Disappointing result. I thought the crowd was awesome. I wish we had been at their level tonight. We weren't," UNM coach Eric Olen said after the game — the Lobos' first loss of 20 or more points in the Pit since losing 85-57 to San Diego State on Jan. 29, 2020.

"We didn't play well. Thought we got outplayed, outcoached in kind of every phase. And not the result we wanted, but we have to respond. We have another good team coming in on Saturday (Boise State, which beat UNM on Dec. 30 in Idaho)."

UNM (18-5, 9-3 Mountain West), which entered the week tied for first place in the conference with Utah State and San Diego State, is now alone in third place. Utah State (19-3, 10-2) remains tied for first with San Diego State, a team the Aggies beat at home this past Saturday.

The UNM win streak had been the fourth-longest in the nation and the third-longest in program history.

You wouldn't have known the arena was home to such a streak the way the Aggies dominated the game for the final 22 minutes. 

An Antonio Chol layup with 2:04 left in the opening half gave UNM a 33-31 lead. The Aggies then went on an 18-5 run spanning the end of the first half and the first four minutes of the second half.

Utah State led 36-33 at halftime.

"They were much more aggressive earlier in the clock, off the dribble in second half," Olen said. "Felt like mostly in the first half, when we had them in the half-court, we were able to put more good possessions together. But they got to the basket. We turned it over. Rough start to the second half, but they were definitely more aggressive."

Jerrod Calhoun, whose Aggies were beaten in Logan, Utah by Olen's UC San Diego team last season and at home by 19 vs. UNM in a first-place game last February, said the hope Wednesday was taking the Lobos out of the comfort zones they found so regularly over the past month.

"Our whole plan was, they're so good off the bounce and getting you in rotations and kicking out, we wanted to show early in the gaps and then really inch out to Jake Hall. He was a big part of our game plan," Calhoun said. "I thought the guys did a much better job to get the shooters (in the second half). All these guys, they're so good at getting you in the air and then kicking out. So I thought we did a really nice job of running them off the line. And then our defense ... when you win the turnover margin and rebounding margin, you have a great shot."

Utah State scored 19 points off 15 UNM turnovers and scored 14 second-chance points to UNM's 2 while winning the rebounding battle 37-28.

UNM was just 3-of-13 from 3-point range after having hit 10 or more in five consecutive Mountain West games. 

"They really extended their defense to take away 3-point shots, limited our attempts there," Olen said. "In theory, that should lead to a few more points in the paint, and some of that rim pressure that we're trying to create."

It didn't. At least not in the second half. 

Mountain West Player of the Year candidate Mason Falslev had a game-high 19 points, hit 4-of-5 3-pointers and added four rebounds, three assists and two steals. Freshman Adlan Elamin added 11 points and 10 rebounds for the Aggies, who outscored UNM 50-33 in the second half.

USU led by as many as 21 points late.

Tomislav Buljan led UNM with 17 points and seven rebounds. Tajavis Miller added 11 points, Hall went for 10 points and five rebounds and Uriah Tenette had 10.

"We gotta look at the film and find the areas we can correct and and play better," Olen said. "We have to play better than that. Boise is playing well, you know, beat us up there. First time, we struggled to score in that one as well. So, yeah, we got to get some things corrected."

Reach Geoff Grammer at ggrammer@abqjournal.com or follow him on Twitter (X) @GeoffGrammer.