What San Diego State assistant coach Dave Velasquez said before matchup against Wyoming
In this story:
Winners of eight of their past 10 games, San Diego State has three games remaining in the regular season. The Aztecs will hit the road for two games, beginning with a trip to Wyoming on Saturday. They’ll head to Las Vegas to take on UNLV on Tuesday before returning home for the regular season finale against Nevada on March 8.
San Diego State remains in a fight for postseason positioning, both in the Mountain West Conference tournament and the NCAA tournament. The Aztecs are one of five teams separated by two games in the conference standings and have improved their positioning when it comes to earning a bid in March Madness.
Tuesday night’s victory over New Mexico was a big hurdle for the Aztecs to complete. They were able to split the season series with the Lobos and showed they have depth in the front court to compete while standout forward Magoon Gwath recovers from his knee injury.
Before the Aztecs headed out of town, assistant coach Dave Velasquez met with the media on Thursday to discuss the upcoming game and how San Diego State prepares for different teams.
On whether the coaches prepare differently for teams based on record:
“That’s part of the consistency of the San Diego State basketball program. It doesn’t matter who you play, non-conference or conference. We prepare the same way. We watch the same amount of film. They have a talented team with a coach who has kept the team continuing to fight and play the entire season in a year where they haven’t won as many games as they wanted. Coach Sundance Wicks has done a great job making the guys compete for one another and it's going to be a challenge when we go off to Laramie on Saturday.”
On what happened in the last game against Wyoming:
“We’re playing with a level of urgency. We need to have that intensity that we started with on Tuesday night, vs. New Mexico. We need that intensity from the beginning. Wyoming did a really good job of taking advantage of our mistakes. We need to have fewer mistakes defensively, so they can’t take a big lead. We have to get into a rhythm and flow offensively, without our offense always having to be created by our defense. Even though that is the staple of who we are, we have to get into a better half court rhythm. We’ve grown since we played them. Offensively, we are starting to learn about each other a lot better, knowing when a guy is going to drive, when he’s going to kick. We’re starting to rebound better offensively and we’re making shots. It’s both sides of the ball, but the level of urgency we have to play with to start the game on Saturday and to win any game.”
MORE SAN DIEGO STATE NEWS & ANALYSIS
FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA
Continue to follow our San Diego State coverage on social media by liking us on Facebook.
-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.