Feb. 28, 2008

LOGAN, Utah -- After cutting the Utah State led to four early in the second half, the Louisiana Tech Bulldogs (4-22; 1-12 WAC) ran out of steam in the final stanza to lose to the Aggies (20-9; 9-4 WAC) by a final score of 86-59 in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum in front of 10,270 fans.

Sophomore Kyle Gibson opened the scoring in the second half with a lay up to cut the lead to 36-33. Utah State responded with four unanswered before Gibson added another three for a 40-36 deficit with a little over 17 left to play. It would be as close as the Bulldogs would get for the rest of the night.

"I really thought we played extremely well in the first half and could even have gotten a lead at some point," Tech head coach Kerry Rupp said, "but we made too many mistakes on the offensive end. We had guys trying to make plays that just weren't there. Our whole thing for this game was to pressure the basketball, and I thought we did a good job of that in the first half."

After Utah State opened with a 4-0 lead, junior JC Clark hit a three-pointer in the left corner to cut the lead to 4-3 with 18:02 left in the first half. The Aggies, however, would add six unanswered points before freshman Orren Tims hit a lay up for a 10-5 lead at the 15:53 mark. Freshman Brandon Mims would add another Tech bucket a little over a minute later to cut the lead to 13-7.

After the Aggies took a 17-7 lead, the Bulldogs answered with a 6-0 run to cut the lead to 17-13 with 12:33 on the clock after Dwayne Lathan put in his own miss. Lathan would hit a three after Utah State took an eight-point lead to cut the score to 21-16.

Gibson got on the scoreboard with under eight minutes to play in the first half to cut the Aggie lead to 23-20. Gibson would tie the game 23-23 with a three of his own shortly after. Utah State, however, would outscore Tech for the remainder of the first half and took a 36-31 lead into halftime.

Gibson lead Tech scorers with 17 points, while Lathan chipped in with 15. Mims added eight points and eight boards for his career-best night. Senior Jaycee Carroll scored 24 second half points for a total of 30 for the night.

The Bulldogs will return to action Saturday, Mar. 1, at 8 p.m. CST. The game will be broadcast live on Cox Sports channel 26 and on KXKZ 107.5 and streamed via the internet at www.z1075fm.com.