Utah State basketball: Aggies win another, but tougher, holiday classic

LOGAN — Three games in three nights, against the toughest field in Utah State's holiday classic history? No problem for the Aggies (8-5), who routed Kent State (8-3) 81-62 on the third day of the Athletes in Action Classic sponsored by Gossner Foods. Utah State went 3-0 in their home tournament clinching first place for the 17th straight season.

While winning the holiday tournament seems almost like a birthright for Utah State at this point, it was something that head coach Stew Morrill did not even think was possible a mere month ago when the Aggies were slumping out of the gate.

"You got to stay optimistic in coaching or you'll become suicidal. You always have to believe that your team is going to get better and start figuring things out," said Morrill. "To win this tournament, and for the most part pretty handily, is pretty encouraging to me."

Kyisean Reed had the best game of his Aggie career, scoring 27 points on 12 of 13 shooting to go along with four rebounds and two blocks. Preston Medlin added 20 points, five rebounds and three assists while Morgan Grim recorded his second straight double-double with a 14-point and 14-rebound game. Grim and Reed were named to the all-tournament team while Medlin was named MVP.

"We are all executing a lot better than we were in the beginning of the year," Reed said. "It's a team effort. Preston (Medlin) tonight set great screens for me, so I was wide open." For the second consecutive night Utah State never trailed jumping out to an 8-2 early lead thanks to six straight points from Grim. The Aggies never looked back, steadily pushing the advantage to a 35-21 by halftime and stretching it to 28 midway through the second half. The Aggies shot 56 percent for the game and held Kent State to 34 percent shooting.

"We obviously had a good night. We shot a high percentage, held them to a low percentage, outrebounded an athletic bunch and against their pressure we only turned it over 13 times and had 23 assists," Morrill said. "Some things that we've done in the past that we are finally getting better at."

The win was Stew Morrill's 200th home victory as Utah State's coach.

Morrill has racked up a 200-14 record in his 14 years on the bench for the Aggies.

"I didn't know that. I guess that just means I've been doing it a long time," Morrill said. "I hope they keep me a while longer."

Texas-Arlington (6-5) used 21 points from Bo Ingram to defeat Saint Peter's (2-10) in the early game, 72-65. The Mavericks of UT-A finished the tournament 2-1, good enough for a second place finish, the Peacocks went winless in Logan in their three games. Ingram made the all-tournament team and was joined by his teammate LaMarcus Reed, and Kent State's Justin Greene.

Utah State will take four full days off for the Christmas break before reconvening for practice on Dec. 27. Coming out of the break the Aggies will head to Mississippi State to face the 18th-ranked Bulldogs on New Year's Eve.