Utah State takes down TCU, 88-72

Utah State dominated TCU 88-72 on Friday evening in Indianapolis to secure a trip to a second-round game against one-seed Purdue and gain their first tournament win since a 2001 overtime win against Ohio State. Utah State started slow in the first half but eventually settled in to take a 43-37 lead at the half. The Aggies would then explode in the second half, scoring 45 points and holding TCU to 35 second-half points. The leading scorer for Utah State was senior guard Ian Martinez, who put up 21 points. Martinez also had four rebounds and four assists. Sophomore center Isaac Johnson scored 19 points and had three rebounds and most importantly, four blocks, which stopped TCU’s progress. Junior forward Great Osobor scored 13 points and led the team in rebounds with seven. Senior guard Darius Brown II scored 10 points for Utah State and had four rebounds and 10 assists in addition to forcing two steals.

As a team, Utah State was 33-60 on field goals (55%) and went 8-19 from three (42.1%) while holding TCU to 24-67 on field goals (35.8%) and 7-22 from three (31.8%). Utah State was also more productive in free throw shooting, making 14 out of 15 attempts while TCU went 17-22, missing five free throws that aided in changing the course of the game. TCU grabbed 40 rebounds and managed to get 21 offensive rebounds, however, the effort on the offensive boards was not enough to account for the poor shooting percentage. Throughout the game, Utah State made 22 assists and also registered 10 steals throughout the game. Utah State also managed to post nine blocks and had just 13 fouls. The Aggies had a ton of success scoring inside the paint, registering 46 points in the paint, which was key to Utah State winning this game against the Horned Frogs. The largest lead for Utah State was 18 points.

Utah State will face arguably the biggest challenge in school history when the Aggies take on 1-seed Purdue in what will be a Purdue-dominant environment. Currently, Purdue is an 11.5 favorite, so Utah State has its work cut out for them. To beat the Boilermakers, Utah State must find a way to slow down star center Zach Edey, who is averaging 24.6 points per game and also leads Purdue in rebounds per game with 12 rebounds per game. Utah State and Purdue will face off on March 24th at 11:40 A.M. on CBS.