Utah State is off and running.
And in a big way.
The Aggies, playing their first game under new head coach Jerrod Calhoun, used a 34-0 first-half run to blow out Alcorn State 101-46 on Wednesday night in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum.
“Those guys were really on top of it,” Calhoun said after the season-opening win. “I’ve been doing this for 13 years and I worked for a Hall of Fame coach in Bob Huggins, maybe the best defensive coach of all time in college, and that was as good as I’ve seen. There was a 10-minute stretch there where they couldn’t score.”
In fact, it was a 12-minute scoreless stretch for the Braves.
“We played against a really good basketball team tonight, and in a brutal environment. It was a tough game,” Alcorn State coach Landon Bussie said. “I think we started the game up 10-8 and the next thing you know the score was 50-12. I’m just happy to get out of Utah.”
Utah State was led by senior center Aubin Gateretse, who finished with 24 points on a perfect 11-for-11 night from the field.
After the game, Calhoun said he’d never been part of a scoring run like that.
“I don’t think I have,” he said. “It was really enjoyable to watch. … The nice thing is we got results. When you come in and take over a program, it’s easy to talk about things, we’re going to do this and that, and everybody talks about their culture. We’re going to play fast, we’re going to guard, and we’re going to play this matchup zone. The best thing a coach can do is get guys to buy in. When they see those results, only giving up 46 points, I don’t care who we’re playing, we can be pretty good at it, and I think it’s going to get better and better.”
The 34-0 run was only the second-largest in Utah State history. The Aggies had a 37-0 stretch against Idaho in 2006.
The NCAA record is the 40-0 run Ohio put together against Cleveland State in December 2020.
