SAN DIEGO – With the stands filled to their most in program history, the San Diego State women’s basketball team had their best shooting game of the season from beyond the arc to beat the New Mexico Lobos 73-56 on Wednesday afternoon at Viejas Arena.
The anticipated 3-point shootout played out as advertised, but it was the season-high 14 triples on 51.9% (14 of 27) shooting from long by the Aztecs (13-3, 7-0 Mountain West) plus stifling fourth quarter defense that made the difference against the Mountain West's next-best top 3-point shooting team before a field trip day crowd of 8,054.
"What a great crowd, I just love the way this community rallies around our women's basketball programs. We have a couple of these games a year and these kids are just excited to be here," said head coach Stacie Terry-Hutson.
Four different players scored in double-figures for SDSU, led by Kennedy Lee’s 15 points on 5-for-8 shooting from downtown alongside a game-high nine rebounds. Nala Williams had 14 points and a game-best five assists, while Bailey Barnhard and Alyssa Jackson each scored 11 points.
Jackson nailed a left corner depth charge with 14 seconds left in the third quarter that stopped a 13-2 run by the Lobos (12-6, 4-3) that had pulled the game even. Then a tough paint bucket by Barnhard and a Lee 3 put the Aztecs back in charge and into closer mode.
San Diego State allowed just four baskets all four quarter, holding New Mexico to 33.3% from the field, while mixing the finishing off the drive by Williams and Nat Martinez with lethal shooting from beyond the arc to outscore the Lobos 23-9 in the final frame.
"It's just going with the flow of the game and also being able to depend on what we run in practice and what we work on on a consistent basis," said Lee, who made multiple 3-pointers in a game for the fourth time this season.
Lee and Barnhard each sunk a 3-pointer and Williams made a pair from beyond, including the 14th, which is the second-most triples in a Mountain West Conference game this season, to help put the result to bed.
Jackson scored 9 of her 11 points in the second half, and had her final two buckets of the game on tough drives to the lane.
"(She brought) toughness, that's something that we can always depend on Alyssa for," Lee said. "We know what she's capable of and we're just grateful for that to show today, everything that you saw out of Alyssa is something we see every day in practice."
The Aztecs were able to overcome a slow start offensively, as they settled for perimeter jump shots for much of the first quarter. New Mexico was able to take advantage of a couple defensive misreads for layups, helping them build a lead as large as 16-7 on a driving baseline score by Alyssa Hargrove at the 2:01 mark.
But CJ Latta would get open on the wing for a 3-pointer with 65 seconds left in the opening frame that got the Scarlet and Black offense on track.
"CJ was really good for us in the first half and Alyssa was fantastic in the second half...both of those kids are high-IQ kids and I challenge them, I talk to them a lot," Terry-Hutson said. "They're extremely coachable, they know when they make mistakes and we discuss it...they just come back and are ready to play, and I thought they did a great job for us. There were some timely buckets for us."
The sophomore guard would snipe a corner triple on the first SDSU possession of the second quarter, sparking a 9-0 run to start it for the hosts. The snowball kept rolling despite a UNM jumper as the Aztecs made it a 18-2 stretch through the first five minutes on back to back 3s by Lee and Martinez.
After being unable to get to the paint early, driving lanes started opening up thanks to consecutive possessions getting the ball on the blocks to Barnhard, where she converted a turning layin and then drew a pair of free throws that both fell.
"They had four guards out there and they were guarding Bailey with a smaller guard, so I threw in a play that we ran a lot last year to isolate her...just to get her looks on the low post because I didn't think that guard could guard her," Terry-Hutson said. "We knew (Lee) would have opportunities in the pick-and-pop type situation because they play so deep in the paint.
"We can anticipate the shots that we're going to get...as a coaching staff we watch so much film, we're pretty confident with the shots we're going to get so we try to simulate in practice so they're confident in the games."
From there it opened the 3-point shooting, as SDSU went 5-for-11 from beyond the arc in the quarter to take control of the game. A late long ball by Destinee Hooks made it 35-29 Aztecs at the half.
Hooks led UNM with 18 points, but only scored 6 points in the second half and was limited to only 2-for-3 shooting in the final 20 minutes. After getting nine offensive rebounds in the first half, the Lobos managed just five in the second and only got a 7-6 scoring edge on a 14-5 offensive rebound advantage for the game.
Martinez and Naomi Panganiban added 8 points each, with both being part of the seven different Aztecs that made 3-pointers. The teams came into the game ranked first (SDSU at 8.8) and second (UNM at 8.5) in average triples per game for the conference for the season.
San Diego State is now 7-3 in field trip day games since the 2020-21 season, and have set program single-game attendance records in each of the past two seasons.
"I love it, it's loud...I'm grateful for the schools that have bought in and care about coming to one of our games, and obviously San Diego State, this is a great opportunity for us to expose our university to a bunch of young people," Terry-Hutson said.
The win sets up a top of the conference showdown with the UNLV Lady Rebels on Saturday, Jan. 14. The Aztecs took two of three meetings last season, including the Mountain West Tournament semifinal, and with UNLV beating San José State 78-50 on Wednesday night it will set up the second ever meeting of teams with 7-0 conference records in Mountain West history.
Tip off is scheduled for 11 a.m. at Cox Pavilion in Las Vegas and will be broadcast on the Mountain West Network.
This story was updated at 8:53 p.m.