LAS VEGAS – The four-sided video board hanging from the ceiling in Mandalay Bay’s Michelob Ultra Arena shows the score, time, period and a variety of team and individual statistics, along with a live feed of the action.
During timeouts, though, it switches to advertisements and crowd shots. The numbers go away.
Mercifully, it turns out, for San Diego State’s basketball team, saving it from having to look at them.
The Aztecs’ showdown with No. 7-ranked Michigan was a game for all of four minutes, which was how look it took one of the best college rosters NIL can buy to erase an early deficit and shift into overdrive en route to a dominant, convincing, emphatic, unequivocal 94-54 victory on the opening night of the 18-team Players Era Festival.
Or put more succinctly: The Aztecs got taken to the woodshed.
Ninety-four to fifty-four.
It was the program’s most lopsided loss in more than a quarter-century, since an 86-38 shellacking at Utah in 1999 during a 4-22 season that got coach Fred Trenkle fired and, ultimately, Steve Fisher hired.
It is their second lopsided outcome in their last two encounters with storied college basketball programs. Last March in the NCAA Tournament’s First Four, they trailed North Carolina by 40. Monday night, they trailed Michigan by 42.
Counting the final two games of last season, losses in the Mountain West and NCAA tournaments, a program that played in the 2023 national championship game is 2-4 in its last six outings.
“I think it’s safe to say, Dusty May got his revenge against me from Florida Atlantic,” said coach Brian Dutcher, trying to lighten the dour mood, referring to SDSU’s dramatic win against May-coached FAU in the 2023 Final Four. “He took it out on me, he took it out on all of us. Michigan has a very good team.”
San Diego State forward Jeremiah Oden (25) drives to the basket past Michigan center Malick Kordel (32) during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game in Las Vegas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
The competition gets easier Tuesday night (8 p.m., TNT), facing an Oregon outfit that is No. 66 in the Kenpom metric and turned it over 18 times Monday in an 84-73 loss against Auburn. But even that might not be enough for an SDSU team team was billed as one of the best in school history and has suddenly, inexplicably lost its way just four games into the season.
“When you’re bad, you’re bad from the top down, and I’m the top,” said Dutcher, whose team’s Kenpom ranking plummeted to 57 after opening the season at 29. “I didn’t have us ready to compete at that level against a very good team. I told them after the game, ‘We can’t think one thing about Michigan when we walk out of the arena, or we’ll have no chance to play against Oregon.’
“As much as it can serve as a learning experience, this is not the time to learn from it. It’s the time to put it behind us as quickly as we can, know that we’re good, get our swagger back up and come out and compete at a high level. … I told the guys they have to drown the noise out.”
The worst part about getting 40-pieced, besides the sheer embarrassment for a proud program, is that point differential is a key tiebreaker in the 18-team event to determine matchups for the third game. Finish in the top 14, you play Wednesday and get home for Thanksgiving. Finish in the bottom four, you stick around until Thursday and eat turkey in a windowless hotel conference room.
And a loss against Oregon, even by a point, almost certainly will doom the Aztecs to that fate.
“As much as this game hurt,” junior Miles Byrd said, “I’m in the process of trying to get over it and get to the next game and turn our swagger back up.”
Michigan players celebrate a score against San Diego State during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game in Las Vegas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Magoon Gwath moved into the starting lineup, and Miles Heide returned to it after tweaking an ankle in practice before last game. But that made little difference to the Wolverines, who simply went over, around and through them and anyone else in their way.
The two bright spots for SDSU both came off the bench, freshman Elzie Harrington and junior BJ Davis. They combined for 26 points on a night when the starters managed only seven, five, five, four and zero points while shooting a combined 17.1%.
Gwath followed a 20-point, seven-rebound, three-block performance in his season debut last week with seven points (2 of 8 shooting), two rebounds, five turnovers and no blocks in 20 minutes. Leading scorers Reese Dixon-Waters and Miles Byrd had five points each on a combined 3 of 15 shooting.
Michigan had six players in double figures, all between 10 and 13 points. The damage was in the collective, outshooting the Aztecs 50% to 27.4%, outscoring them 38-12 in the paint, outrebounding them 49-34, and posting a 22-3 edge in second-chance points off offensive boards.
About the only victory of the night for the Aztecs was a first-half coach’s video challenge that overturned a goaltending call.
May was asked if he expected more resistance from a program that had won its last four games against ranked opponents in nonconference tournaments held in Las Vegas, including Creighton and Houston in this event last year.
“Obviously, yes,” he replied. “But we had a night, we had a great night. They’re still finding themselves with Magoon being out and just coming back. It’s not that simple to put all these pieces together. It takes a lot of intentional effort by the players to really have some self-awareness and play off each other and do things that are necessary to really click.
“We showed our guys. They’re the third winningest program over the last 12 years in all of college basketball. There’s not a program that I respect, personally, more than theirs because of the consistency that they do it with and (how) do it their way. Everyone who comes in, from Kawhi Leonard and whoever else, plays a certain way. Yes, we didn’t expect that to happen.”
Michigan guard L.J. Cason (2) is pressured by San Diego State guard Taj Degourville (24) and San Diego State forward Pharaoh Compton, left, during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Las Vegas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Six days after falling behind Troy 14-2 in what ultimately was a double overtime loss, the Aztecs and appeared to learn their lesson and did this in their first two possessions: a driving layup by Taj DeGourville, followed by a step-back 3 by Byrd, giving them a 5-0 lead.
Then Michigan did this: a 17-2 run in which the Aztecs missed seven of eight shots and had two turnovers.
The margin would balloon to 17 midway through the first half as the Wolverines dominated the boards – on one possession, they had four volleyball tips at the rim before one finally dropped – and the Aztecs settled for mid-range contested jumpers in the lane, the absolute worst percentage shot in basketball if you listen to the analytics gurus.
Harrington made it a respectable 45-33 at intermission after scoring nine of his team’s final 12 points of the half. He finished with 15 points on 6 of 9 shooting.
But they went cold again to start the second half, and by the time they finally scored they were already down 20.
By the time they cracked 40 points, they were down 27.
Soon, it was, gulp, in the 40s.
“There’s a point when you’re so far down, you’re really just coaching for the next game,” Dutcher said. “There’s no coming back when you’re that far down. It’s just trying to keep their confidence up. No sense to yell at a guy who’s down 30 or 40 points. He already feels bad enough, you know?
“I’m just trying to encourage them, telling them the best way to get over it is to believe in yourself, believe in your teammates, don’t get caught up in pity because nothing good can come of that. We’ll work through it. We’ll find a way.”
