THIS WEEK'S SCHEDULE
November 16 (Monday)
San Jose State def. William Jessup, 89-63
^Northern Colorado def. Hawai‘i, 81-75
Television: ESPN
November 17 (Tuesday)
Fresno State at Northern Arizona, 6:35 p.m. MT
Television: Fox Sports Net Arizona
New Mexico at New Mexico State, 7:00 p.m. MT
Television: ESPN Full Court/ESPN360/AggieVision
November 18 (Wednesday)
Utah State at Utah, 6:00 p.m. MT
Television: The Mtn.
Nevada at UNLV, 7:30 p.m. PT
Television: The Mtn.
November 19 (Thursday)
Fresno State at Seattle, 7:00 p.m. PT
November 20 (Friday)
%Louisiana Tech vs. Miami (OH), 7:00 p.m. MT
Brigham Young at Hawai‘i, 7:00 p.m. HT
Television: KFVE-Hawaii
San Jose State at Washington, 8:00 p.m. PT
November 21 (Saturday)
Utah State at Northeastern, 12:30 p.m. ET
Oklahoma Panhandle at New Mexico State, 2:00 p.m. MT
Idaho at North Dakota State, 3:00 p.m. CT
Boise State at Wyoming, 7:00 p.m. MT
%Louisiana Tech at New Mexico, 8:35 p.m. MT
Houston at Nevada, 8:00 p.m. PT
November 22 (Sunday)
San Jose State at UC Riverside, 2:00 p.m. PT
%Louisiana Tech vs. Nicholls, 3:00 p.m. MT
^ Outrigger Hotels Rainbow Classic (Honolulu, Hawaii)
% Basketball Travelers Tournament (Albuquerque, N.M.)
TEAM-BY-TEAM NOTES
Boise State Broncos (2-1, 0-0 WAC)
BSU opened the season with a 2-1 record for the second consecutive season, which marks the fourth time Boise State has started with that record under Coach Graham ... The Broncos defeated Loyola Marymount and North Dakota at the Montana Tournament in Missoula ... BSU’s lone setback was a 92-85 loss to tournament host Montana ... La’Shard Anderson was named to the All-Tournament Team after averaging 16.7 points, 4.0 assists, 3.7 rebounds, and 2.3 steals ... Paul Noonan’s 23 points against North Dakota marks the third consecutive game this season in which a Bronco player has scored 20 or more points, but is the fifth consecutive game dating back to last season.
Fresno State Bulldogs (1-0, 0-0 WAC)
Fresno State secured a season-opening 65-59 victory over San Francisco State behind a huge debut by local freshman Greg Smith and a systematic shooting night by sophomore forward Paul George … Smith earned his first Bulldog double-double with 17 points, 10 rebounds and five blocks in front of his hometown crowd … George scored 19 points, including Fresno State’s first eight points of the game, grabbed eight rebounds and swiped a team-high four steals ... he also converted all 10 free throw attempts, a career-best, for a perfect tally from the charity stripe … the Bulldogs have won their past nine home openers and this marks the sixth straight season the Dogs have started with a victory.
Hawai‘i Rainbow Wahine (2-1, 0-0 WAC)
Hawai‘i opened its season with a 2-0 record last week … senior Roderick Flemings was named the WAC’s player of the week after averaging 18.5 ppg and 11.0 rebounds per game while shooting 56 percent in wins over Southern Utah and McNeese State … he had two straight double-doubles to start the year, propelling UH into Monday’s championship game in the Outrigger Hotels Rainbow Classic … UH is off to its first 2-0 start since 2004 … the team has won its first season-opener since 2005 … UH dropped an 81-75 decision for the Rainbow Classic title on Monday night ... the team was featured on ESPN’s 24-hour Tip-Off Marathon.
Idaho Vandals (1-1, 0-0 WAC)
Idaho opened its season with a 94-87 road win over reigning Mountain West Conference champion, Utah … the win was Idaho’s first over Utah in nearly 71 years, and the team’s first road victory in the series … Friday’s win was Idaho’s first victory in a road season opener since a 76-73 overtime win at Oregon State in 2002 … Idaho had three scorers in double digits on Friday, two of which, senior Steffan Johnson and junior Jeff Ledbetter, were Idaho newcomers in their first action as Vandals … Idaho had a WAC-worst .655 free throw percentage last season, but through two games, the Vandals are shooting .736 (39-53) from the charity stripe.
Nevada Wolf Pack (1-0, 0-0 WAC)
The Wolf Pack opened the season with a victory for the sixth time in seven seasons ... the season-opening victory over Montana State also marked the first career victory for first-year head coach David Carter ... Carter is the eighth coach in school history to win his first game ... Nevada plays four of its next five games on the road, starting on Wednesday, Nov. 18 at UNLV ... the UNLV game will be televised on the Mtn. ... after leading the WAC in blocked shots last year, sophomore Dario Hunt blocked five shots in Saturday’s victory over Montana State ... that marked the 23rd time in his career that he has had more than one block and his fourth career game with five or more blocks.
New Mexico State Aggies (0-1, 0-0 WAC)
Sophomore center Hamidu Rahman scored a career-high 22 points for New Mexico State but the Aggies fell at Saint Mary’s, 100-68, Nov. 13, at the McKeon Pavilion in Moraga, Calif. … Rahman collected a career-high 22 points to lead all scorers on a 7-of-11 performance from the field, and both marks are personal-best showings … he also grabbed eight rebounds, which tied his career high, in only 27 minutes of action … the Aggie big man also recorded 15 free-throw attempts that set a new career-best by five shots … junior guar Jahmar Young recorded 16 points while senior guard Jonathan Gibson added 14 ... this week, New Mexico State hosts New Mexico and Oklahoma Panhandle.
San Jose Spartans (1-0, 0-0 WAC)
San Jose State scored the first nine points of the game and was never threatened defeating William Jessup University, 89-63, in the Spartans’ season-opening game on Monday night ... guard Justin Graham led San Jose State (1-0) in scoring with 18 points and handed out six assists ... three other Spartan starters scored in double figures ... freshman Chris Jones, making his debut, scored 13 points on 5-of-7 from the field ... center Chris Oakes scored 12 and pulled down a game-high 15 rebounds in just 18 minutes of action ... Adrian Oliver, the Spartans’ leading scorer last season, added 11 and collected a single-game career best 11 rebounds ... Kyle Thomas came off the bench and was a fifth SJSU player in double figure scoring with 12 points.
Utah State Aggies (1-0, 0-0 WAC)
Utah State had four players score in double-figures led by junior guard Tyler Newbold’s 15 points in its season-opening 66-60 win against Weber State here Friday night ... Utah State, who has now won 15 of its last 16 season openers, improved to 27-14 against in-state opponents under head coach Stew Morrill which includes a 9-2 record against Weber State ... junior forward Nate Bendall had 13 points on 5-of-6 shooting to go along with five rebounds for Utah State, while senior guard Jared Quayle added 11 points and a game-high eight rebounds. Junior guard Brian Green finished the game with 10 points in his first career game at USU.
WAC NOTES
GREAT STARTS!
Teams from the WAC have gone a combined 10-4 to start the 2009-10 season. Three of those four losses have come on the road, while five of the wins have come at home. WAC teams also went a perfect 11-0 during this year’s exhibition season.
UTAH STATE RECEIVING VOTES IN BOTH NATION POLLS
Utah State enters the 2009-10 season receiving votes in both polls as the Aggies garnered three votes in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches poll and is tied for 48th along with Cornell, Memphis, Mississippi and Southern Illinois. In the Associated Press poll, USU received two votes and is tied for 47th with Virginia Commonwealth and Western Kentucky.
UTAH STATE’S JARED QUAYLE CANDIDATE FOR LOWE’S SENIOR CLASS AWARD
Utah State’s Jared Quayle has been named one of 30 candidates for the 2009-10 Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award, which is presented annually to the NCAA Division I Student-Athlete of the Year. It is the third year in a row that a Utah State player has been named one of 30 national candidates for this award as Jaycee Carroll was selected as one of 10 finalists in 2008 and Gary Wilkinson was one of 30 candidates in 2009. Quayle, a 6-1 senior guard from Perry, Utah is the only player from the state of Utah and the only player from the Western Athletic Conference to be selected for this award.
WAC TOURNAMENT TO RETURN TO RENO IN 2010
The Western Athletic Conference Men’s and Women’s Basketball Tournaments return to the University of Nevada and the Reno-Sparks Convention and Visitors Authority in 2010. The tournaments will be held in the 11,485-seat Lawlor Events Center, located on the campus of the University of Nevada. This year’s tournament will feature eight men’s and eight women’s teams. The Tournament will take place
ESPNU BRACKETBUSTERS
For the eighth year in a row, the WAC has partnered with ESPN and several other top college basketball conferences for ESPNU BracketBusters, a weekend men’s basketball event matching potential NCAA Tournament hopefuls against each other. All nine WAC teams will be a part of this year’s pool of teams. The event will be held Feb. 20. The match-ups for Bracket Buster Saturday will be determined by ESPN in conjunction with the conferences about three weeks before the event.
TOURNAMENT OPPONENTS
WAC teams will play at least 15 non-conference games against opponents that played in last year’s NCAA Tournament, including last year’s national champion (North Carolina).
Idaho def. Utah, 94-87 (Nov. 13)
Utah State at Utah, Nov. 18
San Jose State at Washington, Nov. 20
Brigham Young at Hawai‘i, Nov. 20
Nevada at VCU, Nov. 27
Nevada at North Carolina, Nov. 29
Brigham Young at Utah State, Dec. 2
Idaho at Cal State Northridge, Dec. 3
Boise State at Illinois, Dec. 5
Louisiana Tech at Arizona, Dec. 9
Fresno State vs. Brigham Young, Dec. 12
New Mexico State at UCLA, Dec. 15
Morehead State at Utah State, Dec. 22
Portland State at Boise State, Dec. 21
Nevada vs. Brigham Young, Dec. 22