BOISE, Idaho -- The effort was there, but the Bulldog blues continued Saturday as Boise State defeated Louisiana Tech 74-51 before a crowd of 5,910 at the Boise State Pavillion.

Tech has now lost four straight and stands at 12-13 overall and 9-8 in Western Athletic Conference play. The win pushed Boise State to 12-14 and 6-10.

Senior guard Lavelle Felton poured in 22 points for the Bulldogs, but Tech connected on only 34.6 percent (18-of-52) of its shots from the floor while Boise State made good on 45.8 percent (27-of-59) of its field goal attempts. Tech hit on 22.2 percent of its shots in the second half.

The Bulldogs totaled 20 turnovers, including 12 in the first half, while Boise State committed only 14 on the game. The Broncos converted those Tech turnovers into 24 Boise State points.

"Our effort was much better than our last game," Tech coach Keith Richard said. "We played hard, but the problem was we struggled to score as a team. When you add turnovers on top of a team struggling to score, it puts a lot of pressure on your defense."

BSU led 42-29, but the Bulldogs stormed out and scored the first six points of the second half to cut the Broncos lead to 42-35. But the Bulldogs went cold from there as the Broncos pulled away to hand Tech its worst conference loss since joining the WAC.

"Once again we played a team that stayed inside the 3-point line defensively all game long and dared us to shoot from the perimeter," Richard said. "We ran a lot of plays. We ran a lot of motion but couldn't find a way to score. It's hard to win games when you don't shoot any better than that."

Richard said a defensive change helped Tech's early second-half surge but that the Bulldogs couldn't keep it up.

"We started the second half in a zone defense," Richard said. "That helped early on but it looked like we got fatigued pretty quick and couldn't get back out in front of the ball."

Aaron Haynes provided the bulk of Boise State's offense as the junior forward poured in 30 points and added nine rebounds.

"He's a hard matchup for everyone who plays Boise," Richard said. "He's plays the four spot for them, but he's really a tall guard with sneaky inside moves."

But even with Haynes torching the nets, it was a lack of offense that caused the Bulldogs the most problems.

"Even when we get good shots, they don't seem to go down consistently," Richard said. "We even struggle on open shots. We had six or seven good shots right around the bucket in the first half and couldn't hit them. We just have to go to the drawing board and find a way to play better offense."

Felton's second 3-pointer early on gave Tech a 6-5 advantage at the 18:21 mark of the opening half, but that was only the second Bulldogs lead of the game and the last time they would be out in front as Boise State would build as much as a 26-point lead with 4:05 remaining in the contest. Tech's other lead came on Felton's first 3-pointer 57 seconds into the game that put the Bulldogs up 3-2.

Darrian Brown added nine points and nine rebounds for the Bulldogs while Antonio Meeking chipped in with eight points.

Booker Nabors totaled 13 points for BSU while Bryan Defares added nine points for the Broncos.

Louisiana Tech closes out regular-season play with a 7 p.m. contest next Saturday at Southern Methodist University.