What San Diego State coach Sean Lewis said after the Aztecs lost to North Texas in the New Mexico Bowl

Aztecs come up short in wild 49-47 loss to No. 23 Mean Green

San Diego State Aztecs quarterback Bert Emanuel Jr. (5). | Photo courtesy of San Diego State University Athletics

San Diego State had the right mentality against No. 23 North Texas in the New Mexico Bowl on Saturday, but found itself with too much ground to make up in a 49-47 loss at University Stadium in Albuquerque.

Backup quarterback Bert Emanuel Jr. put up some big numbers in place of Jayden Denegal before being forced out with a shoulder injury, and the third-stringer threw for one touchdown and ran for two more. Ultimately, though, the Aztecs lost control of the game in the third quarter and the Mean Green showed why they have the nation’s top scoring and overall defense. 

“Tremendous fight by both teams. I mean, really entertaining,” San Diego State coach Sean Lewis said. “It's a heck of a job by both staffs. Tip of the cap to North Texas to be able to find a few more plays. But tremendous fight by our guys. Really proud of the way guys stepped up. Talk all the time about a next man up mentality and fighting to the very end and staying till the job is done. Really, really pleased in all three phases the way our guys went about that.

Here are the highlights of Lewis’ press conference:

Lewis on the game overall

“There’s some fundamental things that obviously you'd love to clean up. Love that you would love to do better. Some of the things that we talk about controlling the controllables that we could have done better, but man, what a season, right? It's really hard to win. We did that more times than not and I'm not going to let one game define us. It’s a heck of a group of young men that are in there in the locker room right now and really pleased to lead them, humbled to serve them, and excited about where the trajectory of our program's going.”

Lewis on North Texas’ run game

“Yeah, I mean they did a really nice job in their outside zone dressing up in different ways where we had some gap issues as we went, but the fundamental skill of blocking and tackling is really kind of what this game comes down to, right? Need to look back at, you know, the way that we approach the bowl prep. We had six games in a row to finish, so kind of put our guys on ice there at the beginning and need to assess how much we were tackling, right? We’re going to check the tape, but feel like we didn't tackle obviously at an elite level as evident by the numbers and the way that that game was dictated, too and that's something we haven't done, right? And, you know, so need to look back and that's more on me than it is on the kids of how we approach that work in the bowl prep leading up to it so we can be better in the future when we're back in this position.”

Lewis on what problems North Texas’ offense posed

“Yeah, I mean, they're really good offensively, right? You don't fall out of bed and become the No. 1 scoring offense in the country. They got really good players and then you know there's a lot of personnel issues that we had on our side as well where a lot of our top guys did not play due to injury or other circumstances. So you know kind of a perfect storm in that regard. But it's a heck of an effort by our guys in all three phases and you know pleased with the way that they went about their work.”

Lewis on problems at the start of the third quarter

“Yeah, I mean, great job by them making some second half adjustments. Poor job by us adjusting to the adjustments that they made, right? That's the beauty in the chess match. That is the game. So again, like not an ideal third quarter. I think we had maybe eight total snaps in that quarter because we failed to get a third first down. So again, we got to do a good job assessing how we go about things at halftime to be able to go into, you know, a better start to the second half. And again, that's the situational football where at times where we've done it really, really well. We've won the middle eight and we've won ballgames. Obviously, we failed to convert at the end of the first half. We failed to come out and start fast in the second half. So, we didn't win the middle eight. We came up short.”