BYU basketball: Old friends Steve Cleveland, Dave Rose begin home-and-home series

FRESNO, Calif. — Considering how close of friends the two head coaches are, it's surprising that BYU and Fresno State have not met on the basketball court since former BYU coach Steve Cleveland took over the Bulldogs' program five seasons ago and his former head assistant at BYU, Dave Rose, took over the Cougars' reins.

Perhaps the two were just waiting to get settled in to their new jobs and establish their own programs at BYU and Fresno State. Maybe the setting and time just needed to be right before mixing friendship and competition.

Evidently, that time came when a promoter called Rose last summer saying Fresno State was interested in a neutral-site game in Los Angeles. Rose called Cleveland, who admitted that he was finally ready to face off against the program he coached for eight seasons. Both agreed that a game at the Galen Center on the campus of USC was the perfect place to test the waters, and a good financial situation for both teams.

Those arrangements fell through a month ago, however, when the promoter informed officials from both schools that he was struggling to finalize issues with the Galen Center. So Cleveland and Rose agreed to rescue the reunion-game of sorts and get started on a home-and-home series that begins Saturday night in Fresno.

Rose admits there's a lot of emotion tied to finally facing off against Cleveland — a friend who traveled to Utah twice last summer to visit him during his recovery from cancer surgery. But a lot of that will be dealt with in pregame talks between the two.

"Once we get to the game, I think it will be pretty normal," Rose said.

Even though Rose has never coached or played in Fresno, he expects the Save Mart Center to be packed with a supportive and boisterous crowd. He's also expecting to find a Fresno State team that plays hard, is aggressive on the boards and defends well. Where BYU will try to score in transition, the Bulldogs are mainly a post-oriented team.

"I've watched this team play, and he's got a great front line," Rose said.

Leading Fresno State in scoring is 6-foot-8 sophomore Paul George (17.8 points per game) and 6-10 senior Sylvester Slay (17.1 ppg), with 6-10 freshman center Greg Smith adding 11 ppg.

"We really need to rebound the ball because it's a very athletic team. And we need to contest their shots, because they're capable of having five or six guys have big games. They usually get going by hitting shots, and when they're hitting shots, they're a really good team," Rose said.