BYU basketball: Cougar bench players have another off night

AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. — Dave Rose often admits that a real challenge for the BYU Cougars is team depth.

Early in the season the Cougars were not getting much from their reserves. But then there was a stretch of four or five game in which BYU was getting more than expected from reserves Lamont Morgan Jr., James Anderson, Gavin MacGregor, Charles Abouo, Archie Rose and Noah Hartsock. Each was contributing in big ways to BYU's success.

In the Utah game, however, the Cougar bench took a holiday. In Tuesday's win at Air Force, the reserves basically took the night off — scoring only four points in a combined 46 minutes, and two of those points came in final-minute clean-up time when Hartsock made a basket. Before that, the only scoring contribution BYU got from its reserves was a basket by Morgan midway through the first half.

"We really relied on Lee (Cummard) and a couple guys to get us through tough spots. We need to expand that a little bit, so that we're not so predictable at certain times," Rose said.

The lack of a bench contribution on Tuesday night, Rose said, can be attributed to the inexperience of his bench — especially playing in the cozy and noisy Clune Arena against a deliberate Air Force team.

"This experience is unique when you play here. There are not a lot of possessions and you have to be patient defensively and also be aggressive defensively. A lot of guys get in foul trouble here because they get frustrated late in the shot clock. And I thought we had a group of players that are not used to playing in a really tough environment, but they'll be better for it."

"(The reserves) didn't play with as much confidence in this setting as they have the last couple of times out, but it's a process and you have to deal with young players. But four of those players weren't even in uniform for us last year, so that's something they got to learn here tonight."

What will help that learning, Rose said, was the leadership displayed by Cummard — a Cougar co-captain.

"Lee was the guy who has been in that situation before in this building, and he was the guy who kind of got them all together."