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Fort Collins, Colo.

The start was discouraging. The ending was dreadful.

In between, Utah State's defense almost delivered a performance worthy of a conference champion.

Nobody could have asked much more of that group Saturday night. Well, except for not making a routine stop when the other team was simply playing for overtime.

The final drive of Colorado State's 16-13 victory at Hughes Stadium will keep the USU defense from blaming the offense for this outcome, if that's any consolation.

"They've got to get off the field," said USU coach Matt Wells, while assigning teamwide responsibility for a crushing defeat.

CSU's touchdown in the game's first 80 seconds and two field goals in the last two minutes served to undo a lot the good things Aggie defense did in the other 56 minutes. USU registered eight sacks of Rams quarterback Garrett Grayson (by eight different players) and held one of the Mountain West's top offenses to three points for a huge portion of this game.

That performance almost enabled the Aggies to overcome their offensive struggles in the last three quarters — both with and without quarterback Darell Garretson, who walked off the field with his throwing hand in a sling, bandaged and iced.

Craig Harrison led a drive that resulted in a field goal for a 13-10 lead early in the fourth quarter. That was almost sufficient for a very meaningful victory, but the Rams rallied and turned the MW's Mountain Division race into a "frenzy," by Wells' description.

Losing as time expired "pulls your guts out," Wells said.

Especially when CSU was settling for overtime.

That's the irony of USU's otherwise phenomenal defensive effort. USU punted after CSU's tying field goal. The Rams took over at their 12-yard line and just wanted to run out the clock, until Dee Hart broke a 17-yard run on second down. Grayson then hit Rashard Higgins down the middle for 46 yards, leading to Jared Roberts' 46-yard field goal.

Overtime? No, thank you.

"It just stinks," Wells said.

So you wonder just how much more Wells should have to absorb. USU pieced together a division title-winning season in 2013 after quarterback Chuckie Keeton was injured, then lost Keeton again in September. No problem — thanks to Garretson, who beat BYU and Air Force after losing in overtime to Arkansas State.

But then Garretson exited after taking a vicious hit during a 28-yard completion on USU's opening possession of the second half. The Aggies gained only 77 yards the rest of the game, although their one decent drive produced Nick Diaz's go-ahead field goal.

Joe Hill's 59-yard run in the first quarter gave USU its only touchdown. Hill gained 5 yards on his other eight attempts and the Aggies netted only 100 rushing yards, even without Garretson or Harrison being sacked. USU ran just 50 offensive plays in the game and totaled 260 yards, including 132 in the last three quarters.

Hunter Sharp, one of the country's hottest receivers, made two catches for 33 yards, with a key drop during the offense's abysmal second quarter. CSU loaded up against the run in the second half and Harrison, while not making glaring mistakes, could not exploit the scheme.

"We had a couple of big plays," Hill said, "but we didn't take advantage of the opportunities that we had and it really bit us in the end."

The Aggie defenders could say the exact same thing.

"There were plays out there we could have made to keep us ahead of the game," said lineman Jordan Nielsen.

Or tied, for that matter.

Nobody knows how overtime would have ended, of course. The Aggies can only wonder what may have happened, and that's their own fault.