SJSU men’s basketball stuns UNLV in OT to begin conference play

Matt Weiner (@mattweiner20) – Basketball Beat Reporter

SJSU men’s basketball (10-4, 1-0) stunned UNLV (11-2, 0-1) in a gutsy overtime 75-72 victory to open up Mountain West play. It’s the first time the Spartans have ever opened conference play up with a win and already matches their conference win total from last season.

Fourth-year guard Omari Moore led the way with 15 points and seven assists as Tibet Görener was the only other Spartan in double figures with 11 points.

Sage Tolbert, Trey Anderson and Robert Vaihola each had nine points.

Vaihola was one missed free throw away from posting a double-double as he finished with a team-leading 13 rebounds.

“We withstood a big run from them in the second half and we, you know, we lost a couple of those this year,” said SJSU head coach Tim Miles. “To be able to fight back against a team in the caliber of UNLV I think says a lot about the resolve of our players and that’s the cool part of this whole thing.”

The Spartans used a 16-5 run to enter half-time up 41-30, but saw the double-digit lead dwindle away at the beginning of the second half when UNLV’s EJ Harkless caught fire.

Harkless, who shot 0 for 5 in the first half, ripped off 11 points during a 13-0 run over a four-minute span as UNLV knotted the game up at 58 with 7:13 left.

The Runnin’ Rebels took their first lead on a lay up from Harkless a minute later, and he drilled a three-pointer to extend it to 65-62. He finished with 20 points in the losing effort.

But UNLV was shutout out the final 3:21 of regulation and the Spartans were able to force overtime after doing a superb job clamping down on him and the rest of the Scarlett and Grey.

Moore drove the length of the court with seven seconds remaining in regulation and heaved up a contested deep three, but the shot hit the back iron forcing overtime.

In overtime, Tolbert drilled a three to put SJSU up 72-70 and true freshman Garrett Anderson knocked down two huge free throws to secure the win.

Anderson, who played a season-high 30 minutes off the bench, said it felt good to contribute key minutes in the win.

“It feels like the hard work that I put in is paying off,” Anderson said.

The Spartans didn’t shoot particularly well — 38% from the field and 25% from three — but they played clean with massive amounts of effort and resolve.

UNLV forces the most turnovers in the nation at 21.33 per game, but SJSU only gave the ball up 12 times.

Led by Vaihola (13), Tolbert (six) and Diallo (six) the Spartans out rebounded the Runnin’ Rebels 45-39 and doubled their offensive rebounds at 16-8.

Next up:

SJSU men’s basketball looks to bounce back against Colorado State (85th in NET rankings) this Friday at 1 p.m. (barring any travel nonsense).