This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Las Vegas
Stew Morrill sat and listened as his Utah State basketball players talked about him after his last game. He alternately bowed his head and looked up with a pained expression, processing everything that had gone into 40 minutes of the Mountain West tournament and 29 years of a head coaching career at three schools.
And then he delivered the news that came as a bigger shock than USU's 67-65 loss to Wyoming in Thursday's quarterfinals at the Thomas & Mack Center. The Aggies (18-13) are through playing in 2014-15, Morrill announced, rather than pursuing any postseason opportunity.
That's his choice, and who can say he's wrong? But it definitely was surprising for Morrill to declare the season over right then and there, with so many young players in USU's program — and nothing pressing for him to do.
USU came into March hoping to do enough to merit an NIT bid, at the very least, but things fell apart with losses to Wyoming, Colorado State and Wyoming again. Morrill decided that the players' academic pursuits (classes resume Monday after spring break) and the school's need to move on and hire his successor were more important than staging more basketball games in some other acronym event in Logan, or anywhere else.
So Morrill's description of feeling "kind of weird to be done" after 17 years as the Aggies' coach covered multiple angles, with USU's season of overachieving having ended suddenly. Officially, the Aggies were not finished until Jalen Moore's half-court shot sailed over the backboard at the buzzer. But they really lost this game when they allowed a 7-0 run late in the game — after having recovered from Wyoming's 12-0 run by pulling into a tie.
The Cowboys' experience made the difference. "I thought we had it in the bag the whole game," Wyoming coach Larry Shyatt joked. Yet that was sort of true, once the Cowboys responded after trailing 41-34 early in the second half.
The Aggies could not stop Wyoming's inside game when it counted, giving up a succession of layups and dunks in the second half. Down by seven points in the last 28 seconds, USU tried to produce another Mountain West miracle, after rallying to beat Colorado State in a first-round tournament game last March. They had a shot when Darius Perkins and Moore hit 3-pointers and Wyoming missed 3 of 4 free throws. But after rebounding the ball with 2.5 seconds left, all Moore could do was take a couple of dribbles and fire from about 50 feet. Unfortunately for USU, his shot went 55 feet, over everything.
Moore described his attempt as "a once-in-a-lifetime thing." The reality is he's already used it, having made a game-winning, half-court shot for Sky View High School against Bountiful in the 2013 Class 4A semifinals.
And then Moore spoke of "a once-in-a-lifetime coach," knowing his two-year experience with Morrill was over.
All that remained was one last self-effacing comment from Morrill, concluding the news conference. In a pregame tribute on behalf of the other MW coaches, Morrill had received two tickets to the Bahamas as a retirement present. "I must have been too easy to beat," he said.
Probably not. Regardless, it is someone else's turn in Logan.
Twitter: @tribkurt