Rush The Court

Andrew Murawa is the RTC correspondent for the Mountain West Conference.

Standings (as of 2/4)

1. BYU                                        22-2                       7-1
2. New Mexico                      20-3                       6-2
3. UNLV                                     18-4                       6-2
4. San Diego State                16-6                       5-3
5. Colorado State                  13-9                       4-4
6. Utah                                      10-12                     3-5
7. TCU                                        10-13                     2-6
8. Wyoming                            9-13                       2-6
9. Air Force                              9-12                       1-7

Superlatives

• Team of the Week. BYU. Of the big three in the MWC, the Cougars were the only ones to play twice this week. They won both impressively over teams from the bottom half of the conference, but the biggest reason Dave Rose’s club gets this spot is they lead the conference at the turn. Everybody has played everybody once, and while there is another go-round to be had, the Cougs are halfway to the regular season conference championship.
• Player of the Week. Jimmer Fredette, BYU. Much like his Cougars are halfway to a conference championship, Fredette is halfway to a conference player of the year award, and he did nothing to hurt his chances this week. The BYU point guard averaged 31 points and knocked down four threes in each game. Over the course of the season, Fredette has averaged 21.5 points per game (1^st in the MWC), 4.9 assists per game (2^nd), has racked up 32 steals (6^th) and 50 three-pointers (4^th), while hitting 49.5% of his threes (1^st), 90.1% of his free throws (1^st) and 47.4% of all field goals attempts (7^th).
• Newcomer of the Week. Kawhi Leonard, San Diego State. Leonard has been a monster in the paint for the Aztecs in the first half of the season, combining with junior Billy White and junior transfer Malcolm Thomas to form likely the best frontcourt in the conference. Leonard averaged 14.5ppg and 9.5 rpg this week, a little more than his 12/10 that he has averaged for the season. While the freshman still steps outside of the offense from time to time and takes a head-scratcher of a three or a wild driving charge, his talent is unquestioned.
• Game of the Week. Air Force 70, Wyoming 63. It was an ugly, ugly week in the MWC. The closest game of the week was this seven-point battle between the two worst teams in the conference, in which Air Force broke its 22-game conference losing streak. Beyond this game, all other contests were decided by an average of 18 points with the only “upset” of the week coming when Utah out-uglied Colorado State on its way to another loss in one of the worst college basketball games anyone could ever imagine.
• Game of the Upcoming Week. BYU @ UNLV, February 6^th, Versus. While this past week made for some barely watchable games around the conference, this upcoming week has plenty of intriguing games, the best of which is this Saturday afternoon rematch of a classic from a month ago. This is BYU’s last really challenging road game of the season (they traveled to New Mexico and San Diego State in the first half of the schedule), so a Cougar win here could go a long way towards inching them closer to breaking the tape at the finish line.

League Notes

So, one lap down, one lap to go, time to hand out some midseason awards?

• Player of the Year: Fredette, BYU. Perhaps the only other player to consider here would be UNLV’s junior guard Tre’Von Willis, but that’s really just for show. Fredette is clearly the best player in the conference, and the fact that he’s leading the best team in the conference is just icing.
• Coach of the Year: Rose, BYU. Even if this guy didn’t beat pancreatic cancer (knock on wood a hundred times over) in the offseason, he would be the pick here, getting contributions from players up and down his roster even in the short illness-related absence of our POY, folding a pre-season all-conference selection back into a role-player without so much as a hiccup, and pushing his team out to a 22-2 record in early February? He’s golden, and we’re all glad he’s around to pick this one up.
• Newcomer of the Year: Darington Hobson, New Mexico. While Leonard has been the best freshman in the conference, Hobson takes our Newcomer award as a triple-threat, averaging 15 ppg, 8.3 rpg and 4.2 apg while leading the Lobos into the national spotlight.

All-MWC Team

• Jimmer Fredette, BYU
• Tre’Von Willis, UNLV
• Darington Hobson, New Mexico
• Kawhi Leonard, San Diego State
• Jackson Emery, BYU

Team Roundups

BYU

Looking back: The big game of the week for the Cougars was their battle with in-state rival Utah in the First Deseret Duel, or the Holy War. While the Utes are down this year, they battled the Cougs hard and BYU responded well, committing just six turnovers on the night and shooting 46% from the field and 50% from three on the night. Jimmer Fredette was on fire and finished with 36 points and Jackson Emery wound up with six steals to go along with seven rebounds and four assists. BYU followed that win up by scoring the first ten points against TCU and then coasting the rest of the way to an uneventful 20-point win during which the Cougars controlled just about every portion of the game, including outrebounding TCU 45-36, hitting 11 of their 25 threes (while limiting TCU to just 3/16 shooting) and dishing out 19 assists compared to just eight turnovers.

Looking ahead: Just one game for the Cougars as they kick off round two of the MWC schedule, but it is a big one. A win at UNLV will go a long way towards putting BYU on the #1 line in Vegas in March.

New Mexico

Looking back: The Lobos wrapped up a solid first half of their conference schedule with a ho-hum road win over a floundering TCU team. New Mexico got balanced scoring, with Darington Hobson re-emerging from a bit of a recent slump with a spectacular 19 points, eight rebounds, six assists and five steals. Sophomore guard Philip McDonald added 18 and senior forward Roman Martinez added 16, each with three threes along the way. While the Lobos lets the Horned Frogs stick around for awhile, they pulled away in the second half mostly on the strength of 27 free throw attempts with 20 makes while holding TCU to only nine attempts and a woeful two makes.

Looking ahead: The Lobos remain a game back of BYU, but face a brutal week in the MWC with a trip to Vegas on Wednesday following a home game against San Diego State on Saturday.

UNLV

Looking back: The Rebels had a week to prepare for their trip to Laramie on Wednesday, and it showed. They outplayed the Cowboys in every facet of the game, shooting 53% from the field (including 61% in the second half) while holding Wyoming to just 29% on the way to a 28-point victory. Senior forward Matt Shaw tied a career-high with 16 points, Willis added 15 and Chace Stanback chipped in 12 as Vegas kept pace with New Mexico a game back of first behind BYU.

Looking ahead: The Rebs have what may be the biggest two-fer of games in the entire conference schedule this week, hosting BYU on Saturday then turning around and hosting New Mexico on Wednesday. The outcome of these two games will go a long way towards clearing up the MWC regular season championship picture.

San Diego State

Looking back: The Aztecs had a standard, run-of-the-mill, two-win week, including a road win in Fort Collins in which Kawhi Leonard put up a double-double in the first half on the way to “just” 14 points and 12 rebounds. The Aztec defense really stole the show in that game as they held CSU to just 37% shooting, forced 19 turnovers, controlled the glass (40-33) and held the Rams to just 2/15 shooting from behind the arc. SDSU then returned home to host Air Force on Tuesday and controlled the game from start to finish against the outmanned Falcons. The Aztecs only hit five of their first 20 field goal attempts and still led 12-0 over nine minutes into the game. From there, Steve Fisher’s squad was nearly flawless, turning the ball over only six times while forcing 15 Air Force turnovers and even outscoring the Falcons 17-1 from the free throw line.

Looking ahead: The Aztecs travel to New Mexico on Saturday before returning home to host Wyoming on Wednesday.

Colorado State

Looking back: The Rams wrapped up the final week of the first half of the season in much the same way the rest of the first half of the season went: a split featuring a win over a team they should have beaten and a loss to a team that they should have lost to. The win was a 15-point victory in an ugly affair with Utah and the loss may have been just as ugly as they fell by 18 at home against New Mexico. One of the key problems for the Rams, the lack of a playmaking guard, was exposed this week as CSU accounted for a grand total of 13 assists on their 40 field goals this week. While freshman guard Dorian Green has earned a reputation as a fearless scrapper in his first college season, he’ll need to improve his passing in order to help this Ram team take the next step up from a middle-of-the-pack team.

Looking ahead: The schedule lightens up a bit for the Rams: they host Wyoming on Saturday and travel to Air Force on Tuesday.

Utah

Looking back: In what has been an up-and-down season for the Utes, this was without a doubt an out-and-out down week. The week started out with a hard-fought and scrappy effort against BYU on Saturday, which nevertheless ended in a loss, but things got really ugly when they invited Colorado State into the Huntsman Center on Wednesday night. The Utes clocked in late and clocked out early, failing to score in either the first five minutes of the game or the last five, and in the process dropped to 3-5 in the conference.

Looking ahead: Utah gets a chance to patch their bones a little this week before truckin’ on to Fort Worth on Wednesday to face TCU.

TCU

Looking back: The season began with some optimism for the Horned Frogs. They had a preseason all-conference player in senior forward Zvonko Buljan and two complimentary players they were really excited about in senior swing Edvinas Ruzgas and sophomore point Ronnie Moss and head coach Jim Christian seemed confident about his team’s chances to at least compete with the big boys in the conference. This week wrapped up a very disappointing first half of the season with the clear conclusion that such confidence has not been lived up to. TCU lost to New Mexico and BYU by a combined 36 points and thus far have only beaten the two teams below them in the standings in conference play. The trio has been solid enough, averaging a combined 39 ppg (up from 32 ppg last season), but the Frogs have never had anyone else step up to replace the 14 ppg they lost when Kevin Langford graduated last year. However, there is more talent on this team than its meager conference record would suggest and things do look slightly better in the back half of their schedule as they will get to host Utah and Colorado State.

Looking ahead: The Frogs travel to Air Force before returning home for that Utah game. While a two-win week is within reach for TCU, that Air Force game could be sneaky.

Wyoming

Looking back: The Cowboys wrapped up a pretty dreadful first half of the conference schedule with two more losses, allowing Air Force their first conference win in more than a year and then getting drilled at home by UNLV. Last week at this time, we were handing out MWC POTW honors to sophomore center Adam Waddell. However, he missed the Air Force game with a sprained ankle, and although he returned against UNLV, was completely ineffective, accounting for just three points and a rebound.

Looking ahead: The Cowboys hit the trail this week with visits to Colorado State and San Diego State.

Air Force

Looking back: The Falcons are starting to get healthy again and their win column reflects that, as for the first time in two seasons the number is something other than zero. Air Force got a career-high 23 points (to go along with seven assists) from junior guard Evan Washington, returning hero senior forward Grant Parker got 12 points and five rebounds and freshman guard Mike Lyons, a recipient of some of the extra minutes floating around in the wake of the Falcons’ early season rash of injuries, added 16 points and three three-pointers as the Falcons broke their 22-game conference losing streak by knocking off Wyoming last Saturday. While Parker is still not all the way back (as evidenced by his weak two-rebound performance against San Diego State on Tuesday), we’re starting to get a glimpse of the real Air Force team, still not great but an improving squad.

Looking ahead: Air Force hosts both TCU and Colorado State this week, two games that are not out of reach for the Falcons now. Asking for a sweep might be getting greedy, but Falcons fans have to look at this week as possible split.