Matt Weiner (@mattweiner20) – Basketball Beat Reporter
Year two of the Tim Miles rebuild took another leap with SJSU men’s basketball showing out in the Bahamas over Thanksgiving weekend.
They bounced back from a tough loss to North Texas to take back-to-back wins over Oakland University and Ball State.
“When you look at this you want to gain confidence to beat good solid teams,” said Miles following SJSU’s win on Sunday.
Fourth-year wing Trey Anderson led the Spartans with 15.3 points per game for the tournament and Temple-transfer Sage Tolbert III’s 25 points on 12 of 13 shooting from the field against Oakland was the best single-game performance of the weekend.
But as you’ll find out, neither Anderson nor Tolbert III had the best moment at the Baha Mar Hoops tournament.
Robert Vaihola game-winner
Here’s a little vacation tip: never leave on a bad note.
If you’re going to have an end-all-be-all family argument or an intestine-twisting seafood calamity make sure to do it early on. The last memory of a vacation has the potential to be your only one.
Fresno State-transfer Robert Vaihola was well aware of this against Ball State:
Vaihola’s putback with 1.7 seconds left gave SJSU men’s basketball a win over Ball State and capped an incredible night for him.
He went for 15 points on 6 of 7 shooting, scoring 13 in a second half that featured 13 lead changes.
“This kid [Vaihola] transferred from Fresno State to make a name for himself and tonight he did,” said Miles.
With big men Ibrahima Diallo and Tolbert III fouled out with three minutes left, Vaihola stepped up and scored nine of SJSU’s final 13 points down the stretch.
Here’s a perfect sequence from Miles during his post game interview after Sunday’s win.
First he gave him a wide-eyed smirk.
Second, a ‘that’s my boy’ finger-point.
And finally, the big hug to wrap it all up.
Now onto some other valuable transfer portal pieces …
Plug-and-play
Fourth-year guard Omari Moore is the only player who’s been on the team for at least three years. Perhaps as early as five years ago, a roster with this little experience together would be unheard of.
The Spartans are showing a team doesn’t need players who’ve been at the program for multiple years to have success.
South Carolina-transfer Trey Anderson, who’s in his second-year as a Spartan, went for 16 points against NT, 19 against Oakland and 11 against Ball State. He shot 10-17 from three, including a perfect 4-4 clip against North Texas.
His numbers reflect how quickly a transfer can get adjusted to Miles’ system.
Last season, the six-foot-seven-inch, 206-pound Anderson was forced to play the five due to Diallo missing significant time with a knee injury. Now, the addition of Tolbert III allows him to hang around the perimeter and shoot until the cows come home.
Tolbert III has been SJSU’s best transfer addition thus far. He exploded for 25 points against Oakland and has the sixth-most rebounds in the Mountain West with 8.0.
Flanking Tolbert III down low is Diallo, who’s been a reliable force down low. In Nassau, he had two blocks in each game and his 17 blocks currently leads the Mountain West.
He also went for 10 points before fouling out against Ball State, his first time notching double-digits this season.
Taking care of business
Through eight games the Spartans have shown they can beat who they should beat.
Sounds simple in logic, but that hasn’t been the case in recent memory and frankly historically.
SJSU men’s basketball hasn’t had a record above .500 since the 2011-12 season and only reached the 10-win mark once.
Breaking even requires winning some tough games, but double digit wins? That’s beating a majority of the worst teams on the schedule and a couple conference wins.
SJSU needs four more wins to hit 10 and have 23 more chances to do it.
Improved, but far from perfect.
In their loss to NT, guards Kai Huntsberry and Tylor Perry rained down 51 of the Mean Green’s 69 points for a breezy 15-point win. Not all bad, as the Mean Green finished second in the tournament, losing to UNC Wilmington 55-51 in the championship game.
In Saturday’s 80-67 win over Oakland, the Spartans nearly blew a 22-point second half lead when the Golden Grizzlies went on a 20-2 run to bring the game to 65-62 with 5:22 left. SJSU found their footing and won by 13, but the game shouldn’t have been that close.
The 2022-23 season isn’t about competing for a Mountain West title, although it would be nice. It’s about showing that Miles has the Spartans trending in the right direction.
That direction can already be seen in SJSU’s improvements coming out the gate. Their next five-game out-of-conference slate will pinpoint just how legitimate these improvements are from Miles.
That slate starts with a trek down to the South against No. 11 Arkansas this Saturday at 1 p.m. In a year like this one, even a moral victory would be accepted out of that matchup.