The guy over on the BW boards with all the different scenarios is amazing. My head hurts just reading it. Our best bet is to win both games and hope that UCSB wins out (good possibility) and CSUN beats Hawii on Saturday (another good possiblity...at Northridge). That would put us in a three-way tie and as you said, I think we get the tie breaker. But first steps first, tonight's game will be tough. We played well at UH so I'm hoping that a good home crowd on senior night will push us over the top. It's funny, sometimes when coaches start all the seniors on senior night, it's a pretty odd looking lineup. Mooney, Gonzo, Printup, and Neufeld (along with Manjon) is very solid.

I'm heading down to Anaheim this week and ready for a couple of good Aggie basketball days!!

The betting line has UC Davis as a 2.5 point favorite and ESPN gives the Aggies a 65.6% chance of winning, down from 70% earlier in the week (don't know why). In their last loss, Hawaii scored the fewest points in a game since 1998. Their offense seems to have disappeared. They know they will face a tough game tonight. Interesting that Curry gets back to the Golden State Warriors, but the Aggies have their own Stef who lights it up just like the NBA Steph. Gonzalez' 49.1& from 3 is still the best in the nation by a good 1.7% points. Remember that it was he and Ezra who kept us in the game against Hawaii in Honolulu, as the rest of the team played poorly, yet it was 1 point game. Hawaii will be at full strength tonight (they were missing two key players when they played UCD before), but if Mooney plus anyone else plays as they are capable of playing, I think the Ags will win.

The Athletics Department is encouraging fans to arrive at least 20 minutes early so they can see the ceremony for our four seniors playing their last home game. Joe Mooney, Rogers Printup, Stefan Gonzalez and Matt Neufeld have all been outstanding in their time here and they will leave some big shoes to fill when they are gone.

Riverside really played hard-nosed defense against Hawai'i. Coupled with the Rainbow Warrior's inability to hit from the outside...a loss. We took 'em down to the wire in Hawai'i. We'll have to bring our A game from now on. If we're to have any chance at a #2 seed we have to win tonight. Lose tonight and #5 looks all to possible.

I’ll be there. Grabbing my free pizza guy pizza from Saturday, then heading over. I’m 5-1 this year (Fullerton loss), hoping to see another win!

My wife and I will be there also. Not sure how we're going to keep 6 feet away from everyone though!

Hawaii usually does not do well on the road and they are 2-4 in Big West road games this season. Their current coach, Eran Ganot, seemed to have them doing better in away games in past seasons, but not this year and a local sports writer suggests it is in the players' heads this year that they can't win on the road. I doubt that that's the case, but it's true that they got swept by Cal Poly and Long Beach not long ago and the Aggies are much bette than those two.

Aggies missing a lot of inside shots while giving up too many to Hawaii, but amazing 3 by Ezra!

Needed the Mooney 3 followed by Manjons bomb. A little momentum going into half

Nice crowd. We need to come out with good, aggressive energy and keep it going.

I don't understand why, WHY, teams with 1-possession leads always give the other team a chance to take the final shot. If you're up two with 40 seconds left, go for a two-for one or -- on the opponent's final possession -- try to nab the ball and get a strip or foul with <30 seconds left.

Maybe there's advanced analytics I'm not privy to, but it honestly seems like a 50-50 game at best if you have the lead by 1 or 2 but the other team has the last shot. It's so annoying how many times I've seen "comebacks" end out of that situation.

Eerily disappointing for me, having suffered through the loss here in Honolulu in a similar fashion. Ags seemed to lose their cool on offense at the 3 minute mark, which has become a very bad habit of theirs. I'm not sure if it's a lack of floor leadership. I was not impressed that they were able to break the press because Hawaii is not a good pressing team. Ags also let down on defense. Avea is the lone Hawaii born player and not known for his three-point shooting. He was one of the players who missed the game in Hawaii. Nonetheless, once he hit a couple, they should have been on him like white on chalk.

We survived our meltdown last week against Long Beach but not this one. Some teams seen to just have your number and Hawaii seems to be that team for the Aggies. We lose to them most of the time. That last 3 they hit for the win was deja vu of how we lost in Hawaii.We got sloppy with the ball and didn't get create good shots in the final 3 minutes and Hawaii made the plays down the stretch.

I don't like it when it seems that Les has his team trying to take time off the clock when we have a big lead in the final minutes. We did that tonight and then ended up taking a poor, rushed shot as the shot clock ran down to the final seconds. I think that takes the the players out of their normal offensive rhythm.

Then after we misfire or turn the ball over...Hawaii gets hot an drains a few 3's and suddenly the lead is down to 3. We're 31 games into the season and we we're still not closing out games when we have the lead. Hawaii, on the other hand, has won something like 6 or 7 games this year after trailing going into the last 4 minutes of the game and two of their victims were us.

Ezra Manjon was the only player who really played well against Hawaii. I jinxed Stefan Gonzalez who practically kept UC Davis in the game in Hawaii but only hit 1 of 5 tonight. He hits even one more and the Ags win. Plus no one else stepped up to help Manjon, notably Joe Mooney who scored only 3 points. Hawaii had no business winning. Glad I'm retired so I don't have to hear it from my colleagues (I used to work at the University of Hawaii).

Mooney only played 11 minutes, Neufeld 4.

...and if Les didn't get a T in the first half resulting in Hawaii hitting 2 FT's which ended up being huge considering we lost by 2...

Ironically, Ham worked his towel & emotions, but I can't recall him getting a T.

I was sitting on the court last night and you could feel the change with the second and third 3 that guy made. I think those were the only 4 we made all game. We got tight on offense, tried to force things late in the shot clock and missed a couple decent looks. I like Koehler’s effort but he really struggles under the hoop. That was painful after we looked so good for the first 15 minutes of the second half.

As for the T? Boy, I didn’t see or hear anything that led me to sense a T coming on. Les gets pretty demonstrative at times but that wasn’t one of them

Les wasn't doing anything that at the moment he got the T that would have indicated that he was fired up. He was standing, as he does nearly entire game, and was talking with to the ref who had his back turned to him and, all of a sudden, the ref got pretty demonstrative and slammed a T on him so he must have said something uncomplimentary.

Les has toned it down a lot this season compared to what we have seen a times in the past. He doesn't stomp much at all anymore and he seems to have really backed off lighting into his players and he has also been less overtly critical of the team in his post-game, radio interviews when the team has played poorly. He still won't tolerate it when he thinks his team is playing with a lack of energy and aggression. That will set him off like a stick of dynamite but no good head coaches tolerate what they see as a lack of effort. I actually think that this may have been one of Les' best coaching jobs he's done given how far this team has come from the start of the season.

movielover, I can't recall Ham ever yelling at a ref. He'd yell at his players or become demonstrative with his towel over a bad call, throwing it into the bleachers, but I don't think he ever disputed a bad call/

Joe was clearly not a good choice defensively against Hawai'i. He was burned numerous times. This team particularly needs intense and effective defense to work and Joe's shooting didn't make up for what he was giving up. At least that's how I see it.

I believe Ham was T'd at least once when he felt the officiating had reached a point where his players were in danger of being hurt. Can't tell you which game this was but it's noteworthy for having happened. Ham had his opinions about officiating but on court he kept away from the officials and didn't try to "play" them as is common these days.

I remember a game in Hickey where Ham was just chewing on his towel and stomping his feet so hard you could here it over the crowd noise. Finally, he couldn't take it anymore and went up about 4 rows in the stands behind the team and sat there chewing his towel for a minute or two. One thing he had in common with Coach Les is how hard his teams played and how much he got out of the players he had.

I second your observation about not seeing what precipitated the tech. Frankly, the officiating last night was atrocious. And the ref that T'd Les up seemed to be having a particularly bad game. IMHO, refs are human . . . so, I'll give them each 1 lame call a game - or, basically, 3 bad calls by the crew. But the crew last night had 7 by my count. That kind of performance really impacts a game, and that is just inexcusable. And . . . Les' tech amounts to the winning margin in the end. And I am sure that Coach knows it. And is sick to death about it. GO AGS!

I think putting the outcome on 2 extra FTs midway through the first half is a bit of a stretch. Maybe we got some calls out of his complaints that netted us a few points. Seemed like a non-issue

Just a follow-up. I asked Marietta Hamilton if she could remember the circumstances of the technical I was remembering. It happened at Hickey Gym against, she believes, Sonoma State who had a player who repeatedly submarined players while they were in the air. Ham was all over the refs to get the guy off the court and walked out onto the court (really a no-no in those days). The Sonoma coach was yelling for the refs to "T the little runt". Ham probably set a record by being T'd THREE TIMES in the same game. They didn't kick him out of the gym but he had to just SIT. I'm trying to track down the details. I think it was in the couple of years right after Ham took over the varsity from his being the frosh coach.

Still options for us to finish 3-5. Win and we are 3-4. 3 would require a CSUN win over Hawai’i and UCSB loss at Poly. Could happen. Else we’re at 4/5 with opponent TBD by other two games. 3 seed and we would see Irvine until final.

4 point underdogs tonight which surprised me

I forgot we lost at home to Riverside . They were lights out in first half and built a big lead. Late surge by us got us close. Need to defend much better than last matchup with them

Current Big West Standings:

So we can still finish 9-7 and get a three-way tie for third place if CSUN beats Hawaii and Cal Poly beats UCSB. We're 1-3 vs those two. We lose the tie-beaker with Hawaii who split with the Gauchos. I guess that would put us in fifth place, while a loss would certainly give us fifth place. If Hawaii beats CSUN we fall into the same tie, but the way I figure it, we finish fourth since we swept the Mats. Can anyone confirm my reasoning here? If so, we need to root for Hawaii, but really, for seeding purposes it does not matter since 4 plays 5. It becomes a matter of pride, I guess, and being the "home" team in the first round. Let's look at the bright side. Most forecasters had UC Davis finishing eighth this season.
(Speaking of overcoming low expectations, does anyone know why the 49ers mascot, Sourdough Sam, was at the game on Thursday along with others?)