Isaiah Stevens can flat out score the ball, as is evident by him becoming the only player in Colorado State men’s basketball history to score 2,000 points.
After ending the game against Adam’s State University with 1,999 it was only fitting that Stevens surpassed 2,000 in the Rams opening Mountain West against New Mexico, where CSU won 76-68.
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“Man, I think it was special,” Stevens said. “I wish I would have already had it. … But, it’s definitely just a blessing, I’m super thankful to just have the health that I had to be out there. There’s a lot of talented players that play college basketball, but not everybody gets the opportunity that I’ve been gifted and I’m just thankful for that.”
CSU might have needed 12 minutes to take their first lead of the game Tuesday night, but once they jumped ahead, they didn’t look back.
Team-style basketball was once again a culprit in the Rams win, with four players ending in double-digit scoring.
“I thought we did a lot of things to keep control of the game,” coach Niko Medved said. “That doesn’t mean we were in control to win, but I thought we were in control of how we were playing the whole night.”
The Rams held the lead for 27 minutes and 33 seconds. A lead that they would have to rip out of the grasp of UNM’s hands — something that took nearly 12 minutes to do.
While the Rams played within the flow of the game for a large portion of the night, they started to bend the game to their style during the second half, in which they appeared dominant.
“I did, I thought we did a great job at showing poise, we didn’t allow the game to get frantic,” Medved said. “We took away transition for the most part for them, which is a huge part of what they do. I thought we did a lot of things that allowed us to play the game that we wanted to here tonight.”
While a lot of Rams had it going offensively, none honed into their offensive prowess more than CSU forward Patrick Cartier.
Scoring 21 points on 8-of-12 shooting, Cartier bested his previous season high of 19. When he gets it going, it unlocks something special within the CSU offense.
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“It just makes us so much more versatile and dynamic when he’s aggressive,” Stevens said. “Understanding that we’re looking to play through him a lot in our offense and he makes a lot of decision for us. And more times than not, he’s making the right one. He can finish, he can shoot the 3, he has a great feel for when to get off of it and as of tonight, he was I think the catalyst that really carried us through, especially in the first half.”
The Rams like to play fast and UNM was largely able to slow them down at the beginning of the first half.
But play the game for long enough and the Rams will find a way to get it going. Dominating in the second half is something that fans inside Moby Arena have seen plenty of this season, while the box score says CSU only outscored UNM 43-38, it felt like much more than that, especially during the stretch in which CSU held a 17-point lead.
“I thought our guys did a great job coming out of half time.” Medved said. “Really kind of put their foot on the gas a little bit and did some great things.”
While finding their offense in the second half was a big part of their big run, finding their defense was just as important over that time.
The Rams held several of the Lobos’ best players to uncharacteristic offensive nights. While UNM guard Donovan Dent dealt with foul trouble for a large portion of the game, he only ended up with six points. UNM guard Jamal Mashburn Jr. needed 15 shots to score 13 points and despite starting the game off with a dominant 11 points UNM forward JT Toppin was only able to find six points in the second half.
“We’ve been focusing on being up to touch we say on the ball screens and kind of making the guards feel less,” Cartier said. “But then we kind of adjusted to more of a drop just because the roller was getting behind us a little bit.”
Switching to drop coverage didn’t change the shooting percentages much for the Lobos, but it did lead to three more turnovers in the second half.
The Rams will now set their sights on another tough Mountain West opponent in Utah State where they play at 7 p.m. on Jan. 6 in Logan, Utah. USU wing Great Osobor has been feasting this season and is coming off of a 32 point and nine rebound game against Air Force.
CSU will have it’s hands full, but could potentially have reinforcements on the way. CSU guard Josiah Strong, who was a game-time decision Tuesday night could play against the Aggies.
“We’ll see,” Medved said. “He’s coming a long nicely that way, we’ll know a little bit more this week, no setbacks whatsoever, so he’s doing really really well. We’ll see, but when that comes, I’ll be really excited to have him back.”
Reach Damon Cook at sports@collegian.com or on Twitter @dwcook2001.
