LAS VEGAS — It’s impossible to discuss San Diego State without one name coming up early and often.
Colorado State guard Wes Eikmeier: “We’re going to have to find a way to slow down Jamaal Franklin.”
CSU guard Dwight Smith: “Jamaal Franklin went off for a lot of rebounds last game, he had a career-high.”
Jamaal Franklin.
He was the man of the season – the Mountain West’s Player of the Year – and the man of the moment with a 3-point make at the buzzer to lift SDSU past a strong challenge from Boise State in the MW Tournament quarterfinals.
CSU’s challenge in today’s semifinal against the Aztecs (7 p.m.) is to at least slow him down.
“He’s really good,” CSU coach Tim Miles said. “He’s really good. It’s going to be an interesting matchup.”
In two games against Colorado State this season Franklin averaged 27.5 points (on 48 percent shooting) and 13 rebounds. His career-high tying 31 points and career-high 16 rebounds helped lift the Aztecs to an eight-point victory over CSU on Feb. 26. But his 24 points and 10 rebounds were not enough as Colorado State manhandled the Aztecs on Jan. 28 at Moby Arena, winning by 16 points.
So what it sets up is a game that is a closer matchup than most around the country would think on first glance.
Colorado State breezed past TCU in the first round, getting huge contributions from nearly every player that stepped on the court. A win today puts the Rams (20-10) in the conference title game for the first time since 2003.
Not helping matters is the loss of Greg Smith, the team’s third-leading scorer, who sprained an ankle in Wednesday’s practice and could not play on Thursday. While Smith refuses to close the door on playing tonight, saying “If I can do the things on it that I need to do, I’ll try to play,” odds are not in his favor.
Without Greg Smith, a long-limbed defender, it means mixing and matching defensive assignments on Franklin.
“Greg had been on him,” Miles said. “Now, Greg is unavailable. Dwight will get a crack at him, Pierce (Hornung) will get a crack at him. …We only got seven (players), so we’ll figure it out.”
Outside of attempting to slow down the conference player of the year, Dwight Smith said defensive rebounding will be key.
“This is a big defensive rebounding team,” he said. “We have to match intensity as well, but defensive rebounding is the key. They’re going to miss shots, they’re going to do things. We have to be the smarter team, not turn it over and defensive rebound. …You’ve just got to be able to match what they’re doing and just be the aggressor on offense.”
Lost in the euphoria of Franklin’s game-winning shot against Boise State was the fact that his teammate, Chase Tapley, had a solid game, basically keeping the Aztecs in the contest against Boise State in the second half. He led the team with 20 points and scored 13 of those in the second half.
“They’ve got a lot of great players that can really make plays,” Eikmeier said. “So if we can stay sound on defense and do some of the things we did today we’ll be ok.”
Christopher Dempsey: 303-954-1279 or cdempsey@denverpost.com
