AIR FORCE ACADEMY — The presence of 18th-ranked Brigham Young put an extra spring into the steps of the Air Force men’s basketball team Wednesday night, but steps were yards short of being on a level with what AFA coach Jeff Reynolds called at least the second-best team in the western United States.
With a 13-0 run early in the second half fueling them, the Cougars routed the Falcons 67-49 at Clune Arena. It was Air Force’s 19th consecutive loss in a Mountain West Conference regular-season game.
The Falcons (8-8, 0-3 MWC) scored only 18 points in the second half. BYU raced to its 17th win in 18 games. BYU is 2-0 in the MWC.
“The second half, I thought we did a really good job of contesting shots,” BYU coach Dave Rose said. “In the first half Air Force did a great job of playing the last 10 seconds of the shot clock.
“Defensively you can get impatient. You tend to stand, but we did a better job of playing out the shot clock in the second half.”
The Cougars shot 56 percent from the floor in the first half to offset Air Force’s early energy. They maintained a healthy 38-28 advantage on the boards, including 30 rebounds on the defensive end.
“With them being ranked, every single one of us were all jacked for the game,” Air Force forward Tom Fow said.
Derek Brooks led the Falcons with 10 points off the bench. But Reynolds said his team hasn’t put together a 40-minute game this season.
“We’ve played in spurts all year,” he said. “We played 28 minutes of good basketball against a really good team, but we weren’t able to close it out. That’s not good enough. Tonight we had open looks and they just didn’t go down.
“In the West, other than Gonzaga, I’m not sure there’s a better basketball team than BYU. They have a lot of weapons to beat you with.
“When they went (to a) zone, they slowed it down. When our shots didn’t fall, we became hesitant.”
The Falcons, who tried to rally in the second half, were called for 17 fouls.
“The fouls didn’t cause the shots not to go down,” Reynolds said.
The Falcons played without senior center Mike McLain, who sat out with a concussion.
FG FT Reb
BYU Min M-A M-A O-T A PF PTS
Hartsock 7 0-0 0-0 0-1 0 3 0
Miles 13 3-4 2-2 1-2 0 0 8
Morgan 16 1-1 0-0 0-2 1 1 3
Emery 34 8-13 0-0 0-5 3 1 21
Haws 28 4-7 2-2 0-3 2 0 10
Davies 26 3-10 5-5 4-10 0 3 11
Abouo 7 0-2 0-0 0-0 0 0 0
Loyd 15 0-0 0-1 0-2 1 0 0
Magnusson 3 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0
Zylstra 2 0-0 1-2 0-0 0 0 1
Anderson 1 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0
Fredette 18 2-4 3-5 0-1 3 0 8
Tavernari 30 2-7 0-0 0-6 2 0 5
Totals 200 23-48 13-17 8-38 12 8 67
Percentages: FG .479, FT .765. 3-point goals: 8-22, .364 (Emery 5-10, Morgan 1-1, Fredette 1-2, Tavernari 1-5, Abouo 0-1, Haws 0-3). Team rebounds: 6. Blocked shots: 6 (Davies 3, Haws, Miles, Emery). Turnovers: 9 (Haws 3, Davies 2, Hartsock, Fredette, Tavernari, Emery). Steals: 4 (Emery 2, Tavernari 2). Technical fouls: None.
FG FT Reb
AIR FORCE Min M-A M-A O-T A PF PTS
Lyons 23 0-4 0-0 1-2 1 0 0
Fow 27 3-10 2-2 0-2 0 1 9
Broekhuis 17 1-4 0-0 1-3 0 4 2
Fletcher 28 2-6 0-0 0-3 3 2 5
Washington 33 1-7 0-0 1-7 1 3 3
Fitzgerald 20 3-6 0-0 0-1 0 0 9
Bohannon 18 3-4 1-3 2-5 1 3 8
Merriex 14 1-2 1-2 1-2 2 3 3
Brooks 19 4-11 0-0 1-1 1 1 10
Hempsey 1 0-0 0-0 0-0 1 0 0
Totals 200 18-54 4-7 8-28 10 17 49
Percentages: FG .333, FT .571. 3-point goals: 9-30, .300 (Fitzgerald 3-5, Brooks 2-7, Bohannon 1-1, Washington 1-2, Fletcher 1-5, Fow 1-6, Broekhuis 0-1, Lyons 0-3). Team rebounds: 2. Blocked shots: 0. Turnovers: 8 (Fletcher 2, Broekhuis 2, Washington, Fow, Merriex, Brooks). Steals: 6 (Washington 2, Brooks, Bohannon, Fletcher, Fow). Technical fouls: None.
BYU 36 31 — 67
Air Force 31 18 — 49
A — 3,185. Officials — Dick Cartmell, Larry Spaulding, Martin Cota.
Irv Moss: 303-954-1296 or imoss@denverpost.com
