No. 8 seed CSU grounds Air Force

Friday, March 12, 2004 | 10:06 a.m.

DENVER -- If this is the first week of March and Colorado State is in the house, can an upset be far behind?

Last year, all the Rams did was run the Mountain West Conference table as a No. 6 seed, sinking the 8-ball in the home team's billiard parlor.

CSU's stunning victory against UNLV at the Thomas & Mack Center still has some Rebels fans talking to themselves, but now it's No. 25 Air Force's turn to mutter. The Falcons saw the glass slipper on what has been a Cinderella season slip off their foot, at least temporarily, Thursday night as Ram-tough CSU rolled to a 60-48 victory in an MWC quarterfinal at the Pepsi Center.

It was the first time that a No. 8 seed knocked off a No. 1 seed in the MWC tournament. But given the Rams were the ones wearing the dark uniforms, perhaps that shouldn't have come as a big surprise.

And given that Matt Nelson, their Gulliver-like 7-foot center, was feeling his oats, Colorado State wasn't your typical No. 8 seed.

Nelson, a junior who has been slowed by physical ailments almost from the day he set foot on the CSU campus, played 32 near injury-free minutes against Air Force, scoring 10 points and pulling down six rebounds. He left the game briefly after tweaking his shoulder but when he was in there, his presence was a deterrent to the Falcons, and also helped create some scoring opportunities for his teammates.

"When you look at it, Matt Nelson arguably didn't have his most productive offensive game," CSU coach Dale Layer said. "But the attention he commands on every possession enables our whole team to have more space to operate. When they have three guys around Nellie, it means there was more space for other guys to get open looks."

With Nelson clogging the middle -- on both ends -- and Air Force misfiring from the perimeter (the Falcons sank just 4-of-14 beyond the 3-point arc), CSU hit its first seven shots of the second half and opened a 20-point lead at 43-23 with 13 minutes to play.

Against Air Force, which prefers to play at a snail's pace, that was more than enough. CSU began working the clock, which took the Rams out of their flow and helped the Falcons claw within six twice, but no closer.

In addition to Nelson, the Rams (14-15) also received solid efforts from forward Ronnie Clark, who led CSU with 14 points, guard Dwight Boatner (11 points) and forward Matt Williams (10 points). CSU shot 51 percent form the floor and sank 20-of-23 from the free-throw line in the second half to prevent Air Force from coming all the way back.

But Layer said it's not as if the Falcons are finished. In fact, he said the first-round loss should not hurt Air Force's NCAA tournament aspirations one iota.

"I don't think there's any question, anybody who won our league going away and beat Utah twice, Wyoming twice and San Diego State twice, there's no question they're in the NCAA tournament in my mind," Layer said. "They've had a storybook year and are well deserving of everything they've received.

"It's the best story in college basketball this season, in my opinion. We caught them on a little bit of a bad night but it doesn't diminish the body of work they've accumulated the last four months."

Air Force (22-7) was led by guard Tim Keller's 12 points while Nick Welch and Antoine Hood each finished with 10 as the Falcons' futility in the conference tournament continued. They are 0-5 in MWC first-rounders and haven't won a first-round postseason game of any kind since 1990.

Still, Falcons coach Joe Scott is optimistic his team will get another chance to end its first-round tournament drought in the one that counts the most.

"We've earned our chance," he said of the NCAA tournament. "We've done it all year and I think that's the most important thing."

Jacobson, who went to the bench with his fourth foul with 9:19 to play, returned to beat a trap and hit a clutch 15-foot jump shot that trimmed the Aztecs' lead to 67-65 with 2:40 to play. Justin Hawkins followed with a three-point play on a putback basket, giving the Utes a 68-67 lead with 1:41 remaining.

Utah (23-8) closed out the win on four made free throws by Richard Chaney and three by Tim Drisdom.

Kerry Rupp, the Utes' interim coach, said Utah's ability to stay close until Jacobson could re-enter the game was crucial.

"Nick being the captain, I think our young guys really look up to him and are very comfortable with him being on the floor," said Rupp, who stepped up when Rick Majerus resigned due to continued health problems last month. "It was a tribute to our guys to hang in there and buy him some minutes. And when he came back in, it seemed like our guys got more energy, having him back on the court."

While he was frustrated sitting on the bench, Jacobson said the way his teammates responded might be a good omen.

"It was good for me because I've slowly been trying to trust my teammates more and more and it's difficult because of the age difference between us," said Jacobson, a 6-foot-5 senior sharpshooter who made eight of his 14 field-goal attempts, including 7-of-11 from 3-point range. "It helped me a lot, to see those guys up their play."

Chaney, a sophomore, finished with 14 points while Tim Frost added 11 and Hawkins, only a freshman, had 10.

Center Aerick Sanders led upset-minded San Diego State with 18 points while Chris Walton had 14 and guard Brando Heath 13 for the Aztecs (14-17).

Araujo, the Cougars' 6-foot-11, 285-pound behemoth, was booed unmercifully by the racous Wyoming fans, many of which held up Xeroxed photographs showing Araujo punching UNLV's Jerol Blassingame during BYU's regular-season finale at the Thomas & Mack Center last Saturday.

Many observers -- including about 5,000 wearing brown and yellow -- believe Arajuo should have been suspended for the incident. Instead, but he got off with a reprimand from the MWC office.

"For all of the attention and all of the issues, I thought he played with great purpose," BYU coach Steve Cleveland said after the Cougars (22-7) clinched a semifinal berth against arch-rival Utah. "He kept his composure and played very solid basketball."

He wasn't the only one. Were it not for Luis Lemes, Arajuo's countryman from Brazil, the gutty Cowboys might have been the ones moving on. Wyoming battled back from a 12-point second-half deficit to trim the Cougars' lead to four points on seven occasions.

But every time BYU needed a basket, it seemed the 6-foot-3 Lemes delivered it. He scored 18 points, with 16 coming in the second half.

"None bigger than Luis Lemes," Cleveland said while rattling off a list of BYU contributors. "They kept making big baskets, and Luis countered by making big baskets."

The Cougars needed every one of them, because Wyoming's Mikel Watson kept making clutch shots of his own to keep the Cowboys (11-18) close. Watson, a freshman guard, led all scorers with a career-high 21 points.

The victory moved BYU one step closer to securing an NCAA tournament berth, although Cleveland was still a little nervous about the Cougars' postseason chances.

"I have never felt comfortable about that," he said. "I think we can make a really good case that we belong, but I think the best way to make that case is just to keep winning."