LAS VEGAS — The San Diego State Aztecs trailed New Mexico by 11 points just before halftime in the Mountain West Tournament championship game and Jamaal Franklin had just been whistled for a foul.
TV cameras appeared to show the Mountain West player of the year flipping the middle finger at the referee.
Franklin denied it.
“No, not at all,” Franklin said after the 18th-ranked Aztecs were overpowered 68-59 by the Lobos, who won the title and an automatic NCAA Tournament berth.
Assistant coach Tony Bland, who tried to calm the star guard, later said he didn’t see a gesture.
“I just thought he was frustrated,” Bland said. “I didn’t know exactly what was going on. We were losing. I just wanted to calm him down and let him know we had a whole other half.”
Tony Snell made four 3-pointers in the first half and finished with 14 points, and Drew Gordon had 12 points and 12 rebounds for coach Steve Alford’s Lobos (27-6), who are headed to the NCAA Tournament for the second time in three seasons. This is their first MWC Tournament championship since 2005.
Kendall Williams also had 14 points for the Lobos, who shared the regular-season title with San Diego State but were the No. 2 seed because of a tiebreaker.
San Diego State (26-7) is expected to get an at-large NCAA bid. Chase Tapley scored a game-high 25 for SDSU, and Franklin had 16 points and 10 rebounds.
Playing before a loud, partisan crowd at UNLV’s Thomas & Mack Center, the Lobos set a fast pace early, dominating down low and behind the arc, and the cold-shooting Aztecs never caught up.
New Mexico had a 17-point lead with 6:34 left before going cold in the last four minutes, allowing SDSU to get within five points with 1:21 to go.
“I thought we were atypical, for whatever reason,” SDSU coach Steve Fisher said. “And, again, I don’t want to dismiss what New Mexico did. But I thought we looked like we were playing twice as fast as we should be playing at the offensive end, and I couldn’t get us to settle into any kind of a rhythm, and it showed.”
