David Dennis/All-Star Sports Photography

Box Score

New Mexico St. NMSU 24-6,15-0 WAC

CSU Bakersfield CSUB 12-18,6-9 WAC

New Mexico St. NMSU

24-6,15-0 WAC

Final

Feb. 29, 2020

CSU Bakersfield CSUB

12-18,6-9 WAC

Score By Periods
Team	1	2	F
New Mexico St. NMSU	32	30	62
CSU Bakersfield CSUB	22	24	46

Game Recap: Men's Basketball | February 29, 2020

WAC-Leader NM State Hands CSUB Loss

Next Game:

at Grand Canyon

3/7/2020 | 5:00 P.M.

WatchESPN

1180AM/96.1FM KERN

Next Game

Full Schedule

Mar. 07 (Sat) / 5:00 P.M.

at Grand Canyon

History

Recap
Roster

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. – CSU Bakersfield's final home game as members of the Western Athletic Conference did not go as scripted Saturday night as the Roadrunners suffered a loss to the league's regular season Champion, NM State. CSUB fought to keep up with the hot-shooting Aggies, but in the end, a stellar night from behind the arc helped the visitors take a 62-46 victory in the Icardo Center.

"[NM State] has a really good basketball team," said Rod Barnes, Head Coach of the `Runners. "They have basically dominated our league and have done a really good job with a lot of guys returning from last year's team that went to the NCAA Tournament...I thought our kids fought tonight. I thought we did a really good job, defensively, of trying to follow the game plan. They had some guys step up and make some threes."

With only one regular season game remaining before the `Runners head to their final WAC Tournament, Coach Barnes was asked to reflect on the state of his team: "Hopefully we'll get a chance to see [NMSU] in Vegas…This was something to learn from. Our players still have confidence. If we happen to meet them again, I'll go into the game with the expectation that we can win, knowing that it will be tough, though."

NM State came out of the gate hot, especially from three-point range, draining five of their first ten shots from behind the arc. The visiting Aggies shot themselves to a 23-13 advantage just over 12 minutes into the game. Over the final eight minutes of the first half, the `Runners continued to probe at the Aggie lead, but every time, NMSU fended off the CSUB advances and took a 32-22 lead into halftime.

At the break, Justin Edler-Davis led all `Runners with seven points and six rebounds to go with an assist and a block. The Aggies shot 46 percent from three-point range in the opening period, using the deep ball to build their lead. CSUB converted 33 percent of their field goals but just 18 percent from behind the arc in the first half.

NMSU continued rolling early in the second half, extending its lead to as many as 19 points at 45-26. Bakersfield used a 9-2 run, capped by a Justin McCall jumper, to pull within 12 points with eight and a half minutes to play. Every time the `Runners gained some momentum, the Aggies hit a big three-pointer to extinguish the Bakersfield fire. CSUB ended up falling to the WAC regular-season Champion at home, 62-46.

Taze Moore ignited in the second half, scoring 12 of his game-high 18 points in the period. Moore has now scored 18 points in back-to-back games and remains Bakersfield's scoring leader on the season. Edler-Davis wrapped up the game with 10 points and eight rebounds in a game-high 34 minutes. De'Monte Buckingham, who played two seasons at Richmond before transferring to CSUB, surpassed the 1,000 career points milestone on Saturday night.

Bakersfield (12-18, 6-9 WAC) will hit the road for one final regular season game next week. The `Runners will tackle the hostile environment inside of the GCU Arena on Saturday, Mar. 7, before heading to Las Vegas, Nev. the following week for the WAC Tournament.

~GoRunners.com~

Print Friendly Version