San Diego State and Boise State started their 2-game series at Viejas Arena as the consensus top two teams in the Mountain West Conference. They certainly didn't do anything to change that perception.
The Aztecs beat the Broncos in overtime on Thursday night, then got another tough test on Saturday afternoon in a 62-58 win that, barring an absolute disaster and a bunch of surprises in other conference tournaments, punched SDSU's ticket to the NCAA Tournament.
It was not a pretty shooting night for either team. BSU went a dismal 5-26 from 3-point range while SDSU was only slightly better, going 5-18 from the land of plenty. The lone exception was Jordan Schakel.
The senior guard hit half his shots and finished with a game-high 17 points, with 12 coming in the 2nd half.
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On Thursday night the Aztecs blew a 16-point lead before pulling away in OT. This time they never got up by more than nine and every time they looked like they might be able to pull away the Broncos came right back.
Boise State cut the Aztecs lead to one point six different times in the 2nd half but never found a way to even it up.
Something tells me they're going to see each other one more time this season, in the Mountain West Conference Tournament title game with an automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament on the line.
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The Aztecs have one more regular season game, a makeup game on Wednesday at UNLV. They start the conference tourney as the likely #1 seed on Thursday, March 11.
