For Utah State, feeling bad just seems unavoidable

TUCSON, Ariz. — Because Stew Morrill won't allow himself to feel completely bad about a 30-win season, let me do at least a bit of it for him.

You know, take off some of the pressure.

For the seventh time in the last dozen years, Utah State lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament on Thursday. Same stuff, different year. The Aggies get a low seed, combined with a strong opponent, and the history repeats.

Hello heartache. Bye-bye "Hoosiers II."

Each year a few little guys win early; just not the Aggies.

"It's always tough when it ends," Morrill said.

Just as America is tuning in to March Madness each spring, Utah State is tuning out. Nevertheless, that didn't keep the USU coach from declaring this season an unmitigated success, a few days before the the Aggies' lost 73-68 to Kansas State Thursday.

"There's nothing or anybody this year that will make me feel bad," he said. "I refuse to feel bad about 30-3 (now 30-4) and 15-1 and conference tournament champs, and last year I let myself feel bad when everybody wanted to say, 'Utah State, they gotta win the first round, and they didn't.'

"OK, well, we're gonna try like heck and we're excited to play, but there's nothing bad that can happen. Good can happen, but nothing bad can happen at this point."

But, of course, it did on Thursday.

There was no disguising the disappointment in Morrill's face, or the red, teary eyes of star forward Tai Wesley afterward.

"They were a big, strong, physical team. We knew that coming in," said Wesley.

I should point out a differentiation here. Morrill hasn't had losing seasons, just losing postseasons. You want to beat him in WAC play, you better call in reinforcements. But on the national stage, USU has long chafed under the label of "mid-major."

There are 346 schools that rate Divison-I status in NCAA basketball, and Utah State is among them. It has been to the NCAA tournament nine times since 1998, 20 times overall. A seldom mentioned fact is that USU played in the inaugural NCAA tournament in 1939, losing in the first game to Oklahoma (back then it wasn't one-and-out) and winning on the second night against Texas.

Yet through the years, Aggie basketball has been widely disrespected, or at least dismissed.

Sometimes they come close; usually they give it all they have, which is often far less than the opposition.