San Jose State men’s basketball (3-11, 1-9 MWC) played with a strong offensive effort to secure an 83-71 win in its second game against The University of New Mexico Saturday at Burns Arena in St. George, Utah.
SJSU lost 51-67 Thursday against New Mexico in the first game of the two-game series.
Teams competing in Mountain West Conference play each other two times back-to-back in the same location to minimize travel amid the coronavirus pandemic, according to SJSU’s season schedule.
This was the Spartans’ first Mountain West win of the season and the first double-digit conference win under head basketball coach Jean Prioleau, who became head coach of men’s basketball in August of 2017.
“I want our guys to understand the value that they are able to bring to the game,” Prioleau said in a video posted on the SJSU men’s basketball Twitter account. “And really take ownership of how good they really are. Now [they] are starting to believe [they] can make shots.”
SJSU played without its scoring leader Richard Washington, who is averaging 20.7 points per game this season. Washington did not play due to a head injury he received in the first game against New Mexico Thursday.
“We had a group of guys that bonded together,” Prioleau said. “We’ve been dealing with a lot of adversity and our guys came together.”
Despite missing Washington’s offensive boost, SJSU had five players who scored at least 14 points each.
Ralph Agee, Sebastian Mendoza, Trey Smith and Jalen Dalcourt all finished with 16 points each and helped the Spartans reach their first Mountain West win of the season.
Mendoza went 4 for 4 on three point shots and his 16 points were a career best for the freshman.
Guard Omari Moore scored only 14 points in comparison, however he secured 10 rebounds and ended the game with 5 assists and 3 steals.
Moore went 7 of 9 from the field and maintained a 77.8 shooting percentage to provide a consistent boost to the Spartans’ offense.
The game was back-and-forth in the first half with New Mexico barely coming out on top with 35-33 heading into halftime.
Dalcourt gave the Spartans an offensive boost with a 3-point shot early into the second half.
The second half of the game saw three lead changes until SJSU went on a 6-0 run with just over 15 minutes left in the game.
The Lobos came within one point of tying the score with nine minutes left, but the Spartans went on another 6-0 scoring run to pull away and keep their lead.
Turnovers were a large factor in Saturday’s win for SJSU as the Spartans managed to end with only 7 turnovers compared to the Lobos’ 15.
SJSU was able to take those 15 turnovers and capitalize on them, turning them into an extra 18 points.
The Spartans also had a respectable shooting performance with 46.15% shooting from 3-point range on 6 of 13 shooting in the first half.
An area where SJSU struggled was free throw shooting, which has been the case throughout this season.
The Spartans shot 47.8% from the line on 11 of 23 shots, which is below the teams 64% average this season.
SJSU will look for another win as it heads to Phoenix to play Air Force in a two game series beginning Thursday.
