Wyoming Blows Double-Digit Lead, Falls at CSU, 79-68

FORT COLLINS, Colo., -- "Soft and selfish."

That's how Sundance Wicks described his team's performance over the final eight-plus minutes of Saturday's 79-68 setback inside Moby Arena. From that moment on, Border War rival Colorado State went on a 20-6 run, aided by six straight trips to the free-throw line with the early luxury of the double-bonus.

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The Cowboys watched a 10-point lead methodically evaporate with every freebie.

To make matters worse, the visitors whiffed on 14 of their last 15 shots from the field, held without a bucket over the final 3:01 as the Rams capped the 246th edition of this matchup on a 9-0 run.

"It was 31 minutes of really good basketball," the head coach said during his postgame radio appearance. "Trusting your teammates, being tough -- even though things weren't quite perfect -- you're still tough enough to go make the next play."

Then?

"It was hero ball versus execution ball down the stretch," Wicks continued. "CSU stuck to their game plan down the stretch, and we went away from ours."

The 6,500-plus in attendance had little to cheer about early on as Wyoming seemingly answered every bucket with one of its own. Damarion Dennis, who matched a season high with 21 points, sank six of his first eight shots from the floor.

Khaden Bennett also capped his afternoon with 13, 10 of which came in the first 20 minutes. He also led the team with nine boards.

With 12:37 left in regulation, Abou Magassa made a move in the paint before scooping it up and in to give the Cowboys a 57-47 advantage.

It was all downhill from there, as the Rams finally started to expose mismatches in the paint, drawing 17 personal fouls in the final frame.

Without the services of forward Gavin Gores for a second straight outing, Rashaan Mbemba and Jevin Muniz made themselves all too comfortable down low, combining for 29 points, 16 of which came in the second half. Kyle Jorgensen also looked like his former self, at times, netting 11. Eight of those came from inside.

It was Jase Butler, though, that turned the tide for the Rams late. He finished with a team-high 18 points. Eleven of those came at the stripe.

Wyoming attempted just eight free throws in the game.

"I just told our guys, what makes us unique is -- we're not getting bigger anytime soon -- we got to trust each other," Wicks said. "We got to trust that we're going to look for each other when it gets tough. They're going to go on runs. Teams are going to go on runs, but you got to have the poise and the competitive resilience to keep fighting for the great shots that we want."

That didn't happen.

The Cowboys were just 12-of-22 in the layup department and allowed CSU to shoot 70.6% from the field over the final 20 minutes.

The game plan once again was to limit the Rams' production from the outside, keeping makes to eight or less. They gave up four in the win in Laramie. Saturday, CSU sank that many in the first eight minutes.

Wyoming limited the damage to just 6-of-13, but the shots quit flying from deep once the weakness in the middle was exploited.

"I'll credit CSU for being able to be tough down the stretch," Wicks said. "Weak players play, tough players win. They were tough players down the stretch, just going back to what they wanted to do."

Naz Meyer finished with 12 points and Leland Walker chipped in with a 11. Adam Harakow sank two of the Cowboys' nine triples and Simm-Marten Saadi added another. Uriyah Rojas and Kiani Saxon were held scoreless on only two total attempts in a combined 32 minutes of action.

Wyoming, which falls to 13-12 overall and 4-10 in Mountain West play, returns home Tuesday to take on Fresno State. Tipoff is slated for 6:30 p.m.