What Brian Dutcher said before Mountain West Conference tournament matchup with Boise State
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San Diego State (21-8), 14-6) will officially start postseason play on Thursday afternoon, taking on Boise State in the quarterfinal round of the Mountain West Conference tournament in Las Vegas.
The fourth-seeded Aztecs swept Boise State during their two regular season matchups, becoming only one of two teams to win in Boise this season. After a disappointing loss at UNLV in the final week of the regular season, San Diego State bounced back by blowing out Nevada in their regular season finale to complete the season sweep of the Wolfpack.
Boise State (22-9, 14-6) had won nine of their past 10 games until dropping last Friday’s regular season finale to Colorado State. The Broncos, right on the bubble of the NCAA tournament according to several bracketologists, would be advised to win at least one game in Las Vegas to avoid missing out on Selection Sunday.
San Diego State head coach Brian Dutcher met with the media on Tuesday before the Aztecs made the trip east to Las Vegas. Here’s what he said.
ON MATCHUP AGAINST BOISE STATE
“They say the hardest thing in sports is to beat a team three times, heck, the way we were playing against Boise I was just lucky to beat them one time and then fortunate enough to get them twice and now we'll have a rematch with them again in the conference tournament. Obviously, we have a lot of respect for Boise, Leon Rice does a great job with that team. Degenhart’s a first team all-conference performer and so it'll be a great challenge but one we look forward to Thursday afternoon at 2:30.”
ON BOISE STATE’S MOTIVATION TO MAKE THE NCAA TOURNAMENT
“Well, we better be motivated given NCAA ramifications. I don't try to worry too much about that, I just try to get the team ready to play at its very best and we played well in March, and we continue to do that. So, we will go there and pour everything into that Boise game and then live with the results, but I like our chances. I like the way we're playing; I like our disposition we had a really good practice yesterday, so we'll go out there and play against a really good team. Both teams will be highly motivated, and it should be a great contest.”
ON MILES HEIDE FILLING IN FOR THE INJURED MAGOON GWATH
“Yeah, I think someone told me like Miles Heide’s made 17 shots in a row something like that which is amazing that's almost Aerick Sanders-like. Aerick was here a long time ago he made like 19 shots in a row at one point and Miles is playing really well and that's a boost to his confidence and the team's confidence so hopefully Miles will continue that run and have a really good conference tournament.”
ON THE STATUS OF FORWARD MAGOON GWATH
“Magoon is really day-to-day. He hasn't done anything with the team yet but I look out here and he's doing some lateral stuff and he's doing some shooting and obviously until he gets through a full practice it's hard to imagine him playing in the game, but we have today, we have tomorrow and we'll see what it is.”
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-770033d1c5c4820fdbde4ecf2452e810.jpg "Bodie De Silva")
Bodie DeSilva has been covering sports in San Diego for more than a decade. He previously covered San Diego State athletics for Scout/Fox Sports.