What head coach Leon Rice said following Boise State’s statement win over San Diego State

The Boise State men’s basketball team led wire-to-wire on senior night in an 86-77 Mountain West home victory over San Diego State.

Junior center Drew Fielder scored a career-high 33 points and also grabbed nine rebounds for the Broncos (19-11, 11-8) during Tuesday’s win. Javan Buchanan added 17 points and four boards as Boise State secured its fourth straight victory and a regular-season split with the sliding Aztecs (19-10, 13-6).

The Broncos out-rebounded San Diego State 37-15 and snagged 12 offensive boards.

“I’m just so proud of the way we approached this game and the way we came out,” Boise State head coach Leon Rice said. “The story that we talked about before the game was rebounding. And we out-rebounded San Diego State 37-15, maybe the biggest margin we’ve ever had on them.”

Reese Dixon-Waters had 23 points to lead the Aztecs, who are 1-4 in their last five games.

With one game remaining in the MWC regular season, Boise State and San Diego State are both on the wrong side of the NCAA Tournament bubble.

Here are the highlights from Rice’s postgame comments.

On 12 offensive boards, 21 second-chance points

“That’s who we’re becoming, and we’re a good rebounding team. We knew they’re usually a great rebounding team, and that was a key thing for us. Because you can’t get a lot at the bucket when they’re playing big like that. They come and help and they don’t let you have layins, so you might end up taking a lot of outside shots, which we’ve got to go get those rebounds when we do.”

On midseason improvement

“We’re buying in on everything. We’re buying in on our rebounding … our defense is getting better. We played some pretty darn good D to start that game, and that got us the lead and that got us to be able to be in the position we were with our defense.”

On handling San Diego State’s press, Fielder’s big game

“We need (Aginaldo Neto) to get a little more experience and a little bit better against the press, because he can handle it. And he had what could’ve been two turnovers against their press, and we need a second ball handler. So what we did is we made that second ball handler Drew.

“Drew drew 12 fouls and had 33 points. When you have a center that can handle the ball like that, it helps you break the press so you don’t have to rely on guards against their quickness.”