What Leon Rice said after Boise State’s loss to Colorado State in Mountain West Tournament title game

There was no second-half magic this time around as the Boise State men’s basketball team fell to Colorado State, 69-56, Saturday afternoon in the Mountain West Tournament title game.

The fifth-seeded Broncos (24-10) reached the finals at Thomas & Mack Center with consecutive come-from-behind victories over No. 4 San Diego State (21-9) and top-seeded New Mexico (26-7). But red-hot Colorado State (25-9), the No. 2 seed, was too much for Boise State to overcome in Las Vegas.

“This is a hard-fought tournament, and I’m really, really proud of the effort of our guys to get to this game,” Broncos head coach Leon Rice said. “Hats off to Colorado State. They’re playing great basketball.”

The Rams will enter the NCAA Tournament on a 10-game winning streak. Boise State is firmly on the NCAA Tournament bubble heading into Selection Sunday.

Nique Clifford, the MWC Tournament MVP, led the Rams with 24 points, six rebounds and three assists. Colorado State went 12 of 24 from beyond the arc while Boise State finished 8 of 27 (29.6 percent).

Tyson Degenhart had 22 points and seven rebounds for the Broncos.

Here are the highlights from Rice’s postgame press conference.

On surging Colorado State

“They’re into their roles, they know what they’re doing, moving the ball well. They are really playing well.

“We were running in sand a little bit — looked a step slow — and tried to do some different things. You’ve got to give them credit. They’re playing great. Everything you try to do, they were able to (counter). Go inside, we came and doubled, they made 3s. Don’t (double), they put foul pressure on you and get to the line, all that stuff. So you have to play a really A-plus game — not just with effort, not just with toughness — but you’ve got to make some shots in a game like this to keep it close.”

On Selection Sunday

“It’s so funny when you’re in a situation like ours. Let’s look at it logically. We aggressively schedule every year. We went out and had two of the best wins around, two top 20 teams (Clemson and Saint Mary’s). … Great wins, one of them was on a neutral, one of them was at home. We’ve had road wins … we have neutral-site wins, we had two great ones here. All those boxes are checked.

“So because, on the third day of a tournament, Boston College hits a step-back 3 to beat us, does that mean we’re not tournament-worthy? I mean when you’re breaking it down, ‘Well, they’ve got this one (bad loss).’ That happened in November with a different team basically than what we are now. So when you’re on the bubble … it’s a fine line that you’re on, and one shot can say you’re good enough to be in it, or you’re not good enough to be in it.

“I hope, I know, they look at the whole body of work, but a lot of people talk about it and analyze it and over-analyze it. Hopefully that kind of thing doesn’t overdo it. I think it is the body of work, and we’ve got a great body of work. We’re playing great ball now.”

MORE BOISE STATE NEWS & ANALYSIS

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