What head coach Leon Rice said after Boise State’s loss to San Diego State in Mountain West play

‘Our effort on the glass wasn’t good enough to get it done,’ Rice said

Boise State Broncos head coach Leon Rice. / Brian Losness-Imagn Images

The Boise State men’s basketball team surrendered 15 offensive rebounds in Saturday’s 76-68 Mountain West Conference loss to visiting San Diego State. 

The Aztecs (9-3, 2-1 MWC) won the second-chance points battle 21-9 while handing Boise State (11-4, 3-1) its first MWC defeat of the season. San Diego State out-rebounded the Broncos 39-29. 

“Our effort on the glass wasn’t good enough to get it done against a team that had a week to prepare, was locked in and ready to go,” Boise State head coach Leon Rice said. “We played some good minutes and did some good things, but in the end it comes down to that.”

San Diego State shot 44.3 percent from the floor (27 of 61) and 41.2 percent from long range (7 of 17). The Broncos were excellent at the foul line (21 of 25, 84 percent) but struggled on twos (20 of 53, 37.7 percent) and threes (7 of 30, 23.3 percent). 

It was Boise State’s first loss of the season at ExtraMile Arena. 

Here are the highlights from Rice’s postgame radio interview: 

On SDSU holding Tyson Degenhart to nine points on 1 of 7 shooting

“They are so big and are the best shot-blocking team in the country. They doubled Tyson every time he got a post-touch, and they doubled O’Mar (Stanley). Early, we had some turnovers. Later, we made them pay a little bit, but they weren’t going to let Tyson go in there and get a lot of easy ones.”

On Chris Lockett Jr. scoring 16 points off the bench 

“He’s started eliminating turnovers, and that’s why he gets to play. Because at the start of the year, you’d put him in and at San Francisco, he dribbled off his leg. That’s just being a freshman. But the experience he gained tonight makes him better, and he’s just got to keep getting better. I told him that. I said ‘Hey, when you solve that, you’re going to play a lot. And you’re going to be one heck of a player here, but you’ve just got to keep growing.’

On strong games from Lockett Jr. and Julian Bowie

“I was really proud of those two freshmen, Julian (Bowie) and Chris. They saved our bacon because our big three seniors (Alvaro Cardenas, Degenhart and Stanley) didn’t do what they usually do. And their guy (Miles Byrd) stepped up and did it. So in the end, that’s what you’ve got to do. Your players have to make plays and they’ve got to make shots, and we didn’t get that tonight.”

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