Mountain West Conference Power Poll
by John Eisel
Wow, what an eventful week.
- UNM’s Danny Granger hurts his knee against Wyoming, got surgery, will be back.
- SDSU’s Wesley Stokes doesn’t take care of his grades, won’t be back.
- Colorado State’s Dwight Boatner leaves school. He’ll be back, just not with CSU.
- And then there are the games, where Utah pounded UNLV, New Mexico won again and St. Mary’s beat another Mountain West Conference team. They’re 4-0 against the MWC this year.
1. Utah (13-3) Last week: 2
Oceans are (mostly) blue, the Middle East is in conflict and Utah is at the top of their conference. What else is new?
Last week: Beat UNLV 70-52
What we liked: Hello, Bryant Markson, nice to meet you! A reserve guard his entire career, he scored 17 points against the Rebs on Big Monday.
What we didn’t like: Except for not pulling out early season wins against Washington nor Arizona, not much. The Utes are rolling right now.
2. New Mexico (14-2) Last time: 1
That strange noise you heard coming from New Mexico was a collective profanity when they heard Danny Granger had to go under the knife.
What we liked: They don’t have their best player, possibly the best player in the conference, in Danny Granger for the better part of a half and still win in a walk?
What we didn’t like: Granger. Knee. Surgery. All the talk coming out of Albuquerque is that he should be fine in about two weeks. Hrmmmm…
3. Air Force (10-6) Last time: 5
In years past, if the Falcons had shot 35.1% for a game, they would have lost by 35 points.
Last week: Beat Colorado State 58-53, lost at St. Mary’s (CA) 59-58
What we liked: Air Force can win ugly. And man, was that CSU-AFA an ugly game, especially from beyond the three-point circle. They combined to hit 4 of 37 3-pointers. Amazingly, a one-point loss to St. Mary’s this year doesn’t look that bad right now.
What we didn’t like: The Falcons can’t continue to shoot like that in conference play and win. With the way they normally rebound and with their offensive style, they have to make every shot count.
4. UNLV (7-6) Last time: 3
Hey, didn’t you used to be the preseason conference favorite?
Last week: Lost at Utah 70-52
What we liked: The Rebels were pretty competitive in every statistical category with the Utes, except…
What we didn’t like: The Rebels were outrebounded 43-18 by Utah. No, that’s not a misprint. The Utes actually had 25 more rebounds. Ute Marc Jackson’s four rebounds would have tied for the team lead.
5. Wyoming (7-6) Last time: 3
I just don’t know about this team.
Last week: Lost at New Mexico 89-75, beat IPFW 100-59
What we liked: Jay Straight is on one of his streaks where everything he shoots goes in and a lot of different players are contributing offensively. The only thing I’ll mention from the IPFW game is Steve Leven shooting well, netting 12 points. The Pokes need him to be their consistent shooting threat.
What we didn’t like: The Cowboys cannot allow anyone to shoot 51.7% from the floor. They are too streaky and too inconsistent offensively to let teams basically score at will.
6. Colorado State (8-6) Last time: 6
Let’s see if the Rams come together in this turbulent time, or implode.
Last week: Lost at Air Force 58-53
What we liked: Matt Nelson comes through with 21 points on nine of 10 shooting as Matt Williams is out with injury. My question is, if he made 90 percent of his shots, why he did he only take 10?
What we didn’t like: More questions: How can a team with so much size only out-rebound Air Force by four? And why do they keep shooting 3-pointers? And what is going on in that program when the starting point guard leaves after the first game of the conference season?
7. San Diego State (7-7, 1-0) Last time: 8
I wonder how long the coaching staff knew Wesley Stokes would be unavailable for the winter semester
Last week: Won at BYU 59-57
What we liked: The Aztecs limited the Cougars to 35 percent shooting from the field. In games they’ve lost this season, the Aztecs have allowed an average shooting percentage of 48 percent. In games they win, 32 percent. Oft-injured Chris Walton came up huge for a team that has plenty of talent, but lacking in experience.
What we didn’t like: They made 7 of 12 free throws. They make just over two-thirds of their free throws overall. Being a lousy free-throw shooting team may work against BYU, but it won’t later on down the road.
8. BYU (6-10) Last time: 7
Every team in the conference is now licking their chops to get a piece of the Cougars.
Last week: Lost to San Diego State 59-57, beat Montana State-Billings 110-70
What we liked: Garner Meads is back and healthy. The Cougars need as much help as they can get.
What we didn’t like: They lost a nine-point halftime lead at home to a now 7-7 San Diego State team. That’s plenty.
Coming up
New Mexico at Air Force, 4 p.m. Saturday. Danny Granger would have been really helpful in this game. None of the Falcons can match his athletic ability.
BYU at Colorado State, 1 p.m., Saturday. It’s amazing what the second game of the conference season can mean to a program under the right circumstances. Both teams are trying to stay afloat.
Utah at Wyoming 4 p.m., Saturday. No matter which Cowboy team shows up Saturday, I don’t think they’re going to wind up on the winning side of the scoreboard.
San Diego State at UNLV, 7:30 p.m., Saturday. Let’s see if the Rebels show why they were picked to win the conference title.
Utah at Colorado State, 6 p.m., Monday. This game could turn out really, really bad.
BYU at Wyoming, 10 p.m., Monday. 10,000 Cowboy fans will show up to watch a lousy BYU team. If the game wasn’t at 10 p.m., there’d be 12,000.
If the season ended today
NCAA Tournament: Utah and New Mexico would be hoping the line isn’t too long and they’d fit in to the Big Dance
NIT: Air Force would be on the road in the NIT because their gym is too small.
Sitting home: Everyone else would think to themselves, “Man, that was a short season.”
