Make it 20 wins for the Aggies this season..

The Aggies Beat the San Jose state Spartans on Saturday to increase their streak to 10 on the season. The Aggies are now a game-and-a-half over NMSU and LA Tech. Utah State is now 20-6 and 10-2 in the WAC. The Aggies will head into this week with a 10-game winning streak and hopefully beat La Tech and Wichita State. (Louisianna tech Game on ESPN2) @ 9pm (Wichita State game on ESPN2) @ 10pm

1. NMSU- Beat USU and La Tech, the latter on the road. The WAC championship may likely come down to NMSU @ USU at the end of the season.

2. USU- won 6 in a row, leads the WAC in shooting %, scoring margin, rebound margin, assists, 3 point %, and about every relevant stat I could find.

3. La Tech- finally woke up and realized they were dreaming. Still a team to be feared (after dominating USU early in the season), but not a team to win the WAC regular season. Watch out for the tournament though.

4. Nevada- odd to find them down here. The tournament is on their home floor, so they may still be the team dancing in March.

5. SJSU- had a bit of a quick, surprising start thanks to a favorable schedule. After this road trip, including a 19 point loss at USU, SJSU will find out who they really are.

6. Fresno- what is up with this team? Blown out by USU at home, beat Nevada at home, then lose to IDAHO!? This year's Idaho? Really?

7. Boise State- only here because they beat Idaho.

8. Idaho- only here because they aren't Hawaii.

9. Hawaii- likely to be left out of the WAC tournament this year. Boise State and Idaho may make late season pushes to take the coveted spot on the couch with their Xbox 360 though.

Jahmar Young went absolutely psycho on his opponents last week, beating his opponents with a hose (and 29 pts a game), but J. Quayle was named WAC Player of the Week. Why? Well, let's check the numbers!

I am still very impressed with Young's outing, but I like Quayle's overall game, especially for a short white boy. He had 7 rebounds 7 assists in the first half against BSU before sitting most of the 2nd.

quayle- 70 minutes, 30 points, 14 rebounds, 12 assists, 4 turnovers, 52% from the field, 55% from 3

that is .43 points per minute played, .2 rebounds per minute, .17 assists pm

Young- 70 minutes, 58 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, 5 turnovers, 53% from the field, 35% from 3.

.83 pts pm, .09 rebs pm, .04 assists pm

The big difference is points, but those 12 assists by quayle turn into at least 24 points for his team. Quayle also led the team to a win @ Nevada, which is better than @ Idaho (although Idaho is still good too). NMSU’s win over FSU is better than Utah State beating BSU, but quayle only played 25 mins and almost had a triple double at half time. There is more to basketball than having a guy score a lot of points, and I think that is why the WAC POW is Quayle.

Last night, the Aggies showed that they can be the best team in the WAC. While they have yet to prove it, they definitely showed the potential. What was missing before is gone no longer. The Aggies played with poise. They played with passion. They played hard when they were up, when they blew the lead before half, and when they trailed by 10 points with a little over 5 minutes to play.

Nevada, on the other hand, folded. Once they went up by double digits, they looked to stall the game. After hitting SIX shots in a row, two of them from very deep, Babbitt settled for fadeaway jumpers. While the ESPN 2 announcers talked about how great Babbitt is (and he had stretches where he completely dominated), reality doesn't support his reputation as a great player, at least not in the majority of this game. Outside of his SIX shot streak(still an impressive show if you were watching), he went 3/16 from the field. The six shots he hit were almost all against Modou, who has length but not the body or basketball IQ of Wesley. The disappearing act of Babbitt at the end of the game is partly due to the defense Wesley put on him, partly due to Babbitt not being in good enough shape to finish, and partly due to his teammates wanting the game to just end there. The crowd felt it, I think. There was a nervous itch. After Quayle hit a three to cut the lead, the crowd went silent. Although it was Nevada's first home loss this season, their fans have seen this horror show before.

Last year was a "fairytale season" for the Aggies. 30 wins and only 5 losses.

That fairytale has turned into a slow, unathletic version of "The Wizard of Oz" where the Aggies become the Tin Man, limping through the schedule in search of some heart at the end of some LSD induced metaphor for the gold standard. Meanwhile, they throw enough bricks up at the basket to build a road from here to wherever they think they're going (and if that isn't the NIT, they're dreaming). Playing with heart was sooooo last year.

Stats tell the story of games. I don't care. I'm not going to go into the statistics from tonight's loss to the other Aggies. They don't tell the story about this team. Where is the effort? There are flashes of grit. Wesley wills the Aggies along at points. Newbold goes through slumps that even Shaq's free throws have never seen, but he always tries his hardest anyway. The rest of the team? I've got nothing. No, they've got nothing.

The WAC is hovering around 15th in RPI. This is Big Sky/Big West territory. And you know what? The WAC deserves to be that low. Last year, the WAC was full of young talent. Bad teams (Fresno and La Tech) had some incredible players that returned (Seay/George and Rolle). La Tech has taken advantage of the extra year, but every other team has either failed to move up or even fallen down (looking your way, USU and UNR). The two usual powers are weak and the WAC could be won by basically any team this year.

Here are my WAC rankings. More articles to come when the Christmas stress is over.

1. Louisiana Tech- I could not ignore them, despite no quality wins, simply because they haven't lost to teams that are worse than them yet. Every other team in the WAC has managed to lose games that should have been wins.

I realize there are 6 games today and it would be better to rank them after they have been played, but I'm doing it now anyway. Finals week. Game day. No time. The WAC currently is ranked 11th, right behind the MWC, and has the 7th hardest strength of schedule.

As before, only D-1 games are counted. The WAC started out plain awful, but the depth of the conference is starting to creep into the results.

71-61. Aggies win. Enough said.

Scoreboard, anybody?

photos below, or on this nifty site.

Apparently there is a big basketball game this week.

Oh yeah, that one game I have been waiting a year for.

Don't read into that wrong. This is not Utah State's "Super Bowl." I just really dislike BYU. Ever since my middle school days in Las Vegas as a UNLV fan, it has been obvious that BYU fans were the most obnoxious. I didn't grow up in Utah, so you can't contribute it to being taught to hate BYU (yes, Max Hall I hate you), and I don't really know when it started. I do know I really don't like them though and I will be there 8 AM the day before to make sure I get front row seats to yell insults about their ears, haircuts, mothers, and general lack of righteousness.

It should be loud. It will probably be vulgar and vicious.

On to the game.

BYU comes in undefeated. They have played one road game (at Hawaii) and have looked nothing but impressive when considering the results of their games. They struggled against Weber before going on a huge run. Utah State had a tough time with Weber all game, but had a lead as high as 15. BYU beat Idaho State by 1 more than Utah State did. These teams look reasonably even matched. So what will this game come down to?

Here is the (my) ranking of WAC basketball thus far. I have tried to put more emphasis on performance than potential, but it is obvious that not all these teams will finish with a winning percentage similar to what they have now. Only games against D1 teams were considered.

1. Nevada Wolf Pack- 2-1 No big wins yet, and the loss to UNLV must have been hard to swollow after giving up a big lead, but Nevada seems to be right where they should at this point.

2. Idaho Vandals- 2-1 A win at Utah was a good starting point, but a loss to Texas Southern proves these Vandals aren't quite there yet.

3. Utah State Aggies- 1-2 With two disappointing losses on the road and one ugly road win, the Aggies are not where they want to be. The Aggies held leads most of all three games though, so once they can learn to finish, expect the Aggies to be back to where they were last season.

4. Louisiana Tech Bulldogs- 2-1 The Bulldogs don't have any big wins, but nobody in the WAC does. Miami Ohio gave a good scare to Kentucky, but could not compete with La Tech.

5. Boise State Broncos- 2-2 Boise started off on the road and played well, but they don't seem to have the overall talent to compete with teams even at the level of the WAC right now.

6. Fresno State Bulldogs- 1-1 Fresno State should be 2-0 right now. They have one of the best players, if not the best NBA prospect, in Seay.

7. San Jose State Spartans- 0-1 With only 1 game against a D1 team, we don't know much about the Spartans. The 10 point loss to Washington suggests they might have a good team, but Washington is weak when their guards play poorly. Because of this, SJSU has no claim above the 7 spot.

8. New Mexico State Aggies- 0-2 I expected NMSU to start slow, but a blowout at Saint Mary's and a bad loss to rival New Mexico is not the way to go.

9. Hawaii Rainbow Warriors- 2-2 Even though the Warriors have a .500 record, all 4 games have been played at home and they look like a college pickup team.