SUU, Utah State basketball: Aggies blow away T-birds in 2nd half

LOGAN — Though his team held a 40-32 lead over Southern Utah at the half, Utah State coach Stew Morrill was far from a happy camper.

The veteran Aggie coach looked at the stat sheet, saw his team had been outrebounded by the Thunderbirds (19-11) and that his two post players had combined for just three shots. And he delivered a strong directive to change a few things.

"I think they got the message at halftime," Morrill said.

Indeed.

The Aggies opened the second half with a 16-0 run to blow the game open and cruised to a dominating 89-49 win over Coach Roger Reid's T-Birds.

USU won the rebound battle 36-35 and started feeding the ball to Tai Wesley and Nate Bendall.

But it was a pair of unexpected performances on the perimeter that really stood out for the Aggies, who improved to 3-2 while SUU dropped to 3-4.

Junior swingman Pooh Williams scored a career-high 17 points, hitting 6-of-7 shots including four 3-pointers.

He also played some lockdown defense on SUU's leading scoring, Davis Baker, and held the Thunderbird senior to 10 points.

Most surprising, though, was 17 points from true freshman Preston Medlin.

The Texas native had not scored a point all season and spends most of his practice time on the scout team. When he had an open jumper or two early in the game, he nervously passed the ball.

Morrill gave the youngster a stern look and told him to let it fly.

"He said 'OK,' and he made a few," Morrill said.

The Aggies held the T-Birds to just 20 percent shooting in the second half and turned in a 59.4 percent effort themselves.

"This is a good team we are talking about," Reid said. "And this is a tough place to play. In the first half, I was pleased with the way we kept hanging in there."

Despite a strong start by the Aggies, fueled by a handful of SUU turnovers, the game was tight until the break. Utah State never trailed and led by as many as 13 early in the game.

But a flurry of 3-pointers by Ryan Brimley and Drew Allen brought the T-Birds back into it at 27-26 with 5:14 left in the first.

After that, USU put the defensive clamps on and ran away from their opponents.