The SDSU men’s basketball team dropped their final game of the regular season in a 75-70 loss to USD. With the regular season officially over, the Jacks will head to Sioux Falls for the Summit League Tournament.
Despite leading at halftime, a huge second half by the Coyotes ended the season off on a bad note for the Jacks. Leading 42 to 38 at the half, SDSU was in the midst of a good shooting performance, shooting more than 50% from the field and nearly 72% from three.
But after the solid first half, they went cold. SDSU went 11-34 from the field while South Dakota went 11-22. The Coyotes’ free-throw shooting was a factor in the loss. The Coyotes shot 31 free throws and scored 25 points off of them. Conversely, the Jacks went 9-13.
Joe Sayler led SDSU in points with 24, while Jordan Crawford and Cameron Fens tied for team high points with 17 for the Yotes.
SUMMIT LEAGUE
Thursday will mark the beginning of the postseason for SDSU, and their journey towards Summit League champions will be lined with tough opponents. Going 14-17 on the season, SDSU got the No. 7 seed. The St. Thomas Tommies will seek their third straight win on the season and their third straight victory over the Jackrabbits.
By scoring margin, they rank second in the Summit League in both offense and defense, scoring 83.3 points on average while giving up 72.
Going into this season, SDSU was 7-2 against St. Thomas, but thanks in part to Summit League Freshman of the Year Nick Janowski, the Tommies have built up momentum.
St. Thomas has averaged 75.5 points a game this season against SDSU while the Jacks have averaged 65.5 points against the Tommies. One of those losses was a blowout. But in the first matchup, SDSU was able to keep it competitive between the two teams, losing 69-75 on the road. The previously mentioned Janowski averaged 22 points a game against SDSU. A team that is good at essentially every facet of the game, the one underlying statistic that shows a weakness is their rebounding. Out of nine Summit League teams, they rank seventh in team rebounding and last in offensive rebounds. Their defensive rebounding does make up for some of their struggles, but with SDSU being arguably the best rebounding team in the Summit League, that is something that could tip the scales towards the Jacks.
“We gotta play really well,” said head coach Bryan Peterson on beating St. Thomas. “We gotta do it for 40 minutes … I think we’ve had some really good spurts against them but we just gotta put 40 minutes against them.”
If SDSU beats St. Thomas, they’ll face either North Dakota or Denver. The Jacks beat both of those teams this year, splitting each series 1-1. In their first game against North Dakota, they lost in overtime. At home, SDSU beat the Hawks 91-83.
Against Denver, their first game was a win at home and then subsequently lost 61-79 away. If going by seeding, Denver would be the most ideal opponent. The No. 6 seed, they are a streaky team defined by their Summit League leading offense but also by their second worst defense.
The Pioneers have the Summit League scoring leader in Carson Johnson, who averages 20.2 points a night and has the best three-point shooting percentage, going .413 from beyond the arc.
North Dakota is a more balanced team, the No. 3 ranked team in the league, their offense is ranked fifth best and their defense sixth best.
SDSU’s postseason bout against St. Thomas will be played at the Denny Sanford PREMIER center in Sioux Falls. Streaming for the game will be provided by Midco Sports and the Summit League Network, further rounds will be offered by the CBS Sports Network.
