LIVE BLOG: New Mexico defeats San Diego State, 76-67

POSTGAME RECAP/ANALYSIS

The problems that plagued the Aztecs in the first half were persistent through the second: Poor foul shooting and turnovers. The most costly turnover of the game, however, came in the form of Nathan Mensah's technical foul. It ended up being his fifth and final of the contest, since he was assessed it after his fourth foul around the eight-minute mark of the second half.

Mensah fouling out was the clear turning point, as the Lobos ripped off a 12-0 run when he left the contest. Specifically, Jaelen House caught fire for New Mexico, ending the contest with 29 points. He was perfect from the free throw line, while the Aztecs were 11-21 overall for the game.

Overall, SDSU was 25-59 from the field in this one (42%), shooting a measly 25% from three point land.

This is San Diego State's first Mountain West loss of the season, bringing their conference record to 4-1. The No. 23 team in the country is now 13-4 on the season.

SECOND HALF

END OF GAME, SCORE: 76-67, New Mexico — Jaelen House once again made his free throws. A tough loss for the Aztecs.

29.3 seconds remaining, SCORE: 74-67, New Mexico — Butler again shows a sense of urgency, driving down the court for a quick two after House hit his free throws. Butler fouls House again on the inbound.

37.2 seconds remaining, SCORE: 72-65, New Mexico — Butler quickly sinks a three to cut into the Lobos lead. Down seven with less than 40 seconds is a tall order, though. SDSU calls timeout.

43.5 seconds remaining, SCORE: 70-62, New Mexico — After the offensive foul, Mashburn hit a clean step back jumper to extend the Lobos lead. Keshad Johnson responded with a dunk after a nice pass from Butler. Bradley fouled Mashburn, giving NM a one-and-one opportunity. He made both shots.

SDSU continues to foul, but it looks like the Lobos will be coming home with the W.

1:50 remaining, SCORE: 66-60, New Mexico — The Lobos made a second chance layup following Bradley's frontend miss on the 1-and-1. Bradley tried to take over on the other end, but he was called for an offensive foul as he tried to back down his defender.

2:29 remaining, SCORE: 64-60, New Mexico — Lamont Butler makes back to back free throws, and the Aztecs breakout the full court press. New Mexico turned it over on their next possession. Following that, Matt Bradley looked like he finished a tough basket inside, but the officials said the foul was on the floor. He missed the front end of the 1-and-1, continuing the storyline of poor foul shooting for the Aztecs.

4:05 remaining, SCORE: 64-58, New Mexico — Adam Seiko is doing his best to single-handedly bring back the Aztecs. He nailed another three pointer, and the crowd roared with excitement. New Mexico calls a 30-second timeout in an attempt to cool down Seiko's shooting streak.

5:13 remaining, SCORE: 63-55, New Mexico — They say the House always wins, well Jaelen has been firing on all cylinders since Mensah fouled out of the game. NOT SO FAST — despite finding his shooting zone, House was assessed with a technical foul of his own, allowing SDSU to chip away at the lead.

Adam Seiko scored five points after the T: he made both foul shots and nailed a three pointer on the ensuing possession. Lamont Butler assisted on the three.

8:04 remaining (media timeout), SCORE: 53-49, New Mexico — The Lobos cashed in on that technical foul — big time. Jaelen House made both foul shots, and proceeded to hit a three on the ensuing possession. New Mexico has the lead again, 53-49.

8:20 remaining, SCORE: 49-48, San Diego State — Although the Aztecs took the lead, the team lost a major piece in this moment. After getting his fourth foul, Nathan Mensah was visibly upset with the referee, who then proceeded to issue him a technical foul. This was his fifth foul of the game, so Mensah was booted from the contest, with an eternity on the clock, mind you.

Mensah's presence inside has been huge for SDSU, so it will be difficult not having him anchoring the front court.

The 49-48 lead is SDSU's first since being up 2-0 at the start of the game.

9:23 remaining, SCORE: 48-48, tie game — Since the media timeout, both teams are a combined 2-7 from the field and have turned the ball over five times. Talk about a messy game!

13:31 remaining, SCORE: 45-45, tie game — We have ourselves a ball game, folks! San Diego State has finally eliminated the deficit, tying up the contest thanks to ferocious defense and strong rebounding leading to second chance points.

Lobos took a timeout to slow down the Aztec run. We'll see how it plays out coming out of the break.

14:30 remaining, SCORE: 45-42, New Mexico — Oh. My. Goodness. Keshad Johnson had an ABSOLUTE JAM thanks to a New Mexico turnover. Looks like SDSU is finally taking advantage of the sloppy ball handling. You'll want to find that highlight later if you missed this contest.

15:56 remaining, SCORE: 43-40, New Mexico — Bradley hit both of his foul shots, cutting the Lobos lead to three. In the first half, the Aztecs were a pathetic 1-7 from the line, so SDSU fans are pleased to see those "gimmie" shots go in.

16:12 remaining, SCORE: 43-38, New Mexico — Mensah picks up his third personal foul of the contest. The crowd here in Viejas is letting them have it, and Mashburn went 1-2 from the line. Lobos now lead by five.

Before Mensah's foul, Bradley hit a beautiful step back jumper, clear evidence he's finding his stroke.

18:10 remaining, SCORE: 40-34, New Mexico — Mensah opened up the second half with an easy dunk for the Aztecs, and after a New Mexico turnover, Keshon Johnson converted on a high-percentage layup.

New Mexico responded with a layup of their own, but a Lamont Butler steal and fastbreak score woke up Viejas Arena. The Lobos lead is now down to six.

HALFTIME ANALYSIS

San Diego State's 10-point deficit at the break can be attributed to two things: poor shooting and allowing easy points off turnovers. The Aztecs went 12-32 from the field in the first frame, which translates to a 37.5% field goal percentage. The Lobos are shooting less than 50% from the field themselves, but they converted eight points off of turnovers.

Both teams were sloppy with the ball in the first half: the Lobos had five turnovers to SDSU's six. The difference? SDSU failed to take advantage of the early New Mexico turnovers. I will point out though, most of the Lobos turnovers were balls thrown out of bounds, so of course it's not possible to get an easy fast break off those.

Surprisingly, both teams ended up 3-11 from three point land in the first half (New Mexico was hitting theirs early). Matt Bradley has 8 points, and is 2-2 from three, but his midrange shots haven't been landing. Bradley hit those threes late in the first, so perhaps he will continue to find his rhythm in the next half.

Another red flag for the Aztecs was foul shooting. Here's what 10News sports director Ben Higgins had to say about that:

New Mexico guard Jamal Mashburn, Jr. leads all scorers with 15 points. He is 7-10 from the field so far, going 1-2 from deep.

FIRST HALF

End of first half, SCORE: 38-28, New Mexico — Both teams went cold to close out the first half. The Lobos go into the break with a 10-point lead.

00:33.6 remaining, SCORE: 38-28, New Mexico — San Diego State calls a timeout. Coach Brian Dutcher is looking to avoid going into halftime with a double digit deficit.

2:21 remaining, SCORE: 34-26, New Mexico — Ask and ye shall receive: Bradley nailed a three pointer to start getting out of his slump. The Lobos called a 30-second timeout after a Trammell miss from deep (use it or lose it!).

3:26 remaining (under 4-minute timeout), SCORE: 32-23, New Mexico — It appears the crowd is having a slight impact on the game: Mashburn turned the ball over after looking rushed when fans started chanting "5...4...3...2..." as if the shot clock was about to expire, but in reality, there was still 14 seconds on the clock. Seiko stole the ball, leading to a New Mexico foul on the other end.

Keshad Johnson missed both attempts from the charity stripe. After multiple misses from both sides, New Mexico scored easy fast break points thanks to an SDSU turnover. The Aztecs were 1-6 from the field after the under-eight timeout. Meanwhile, the Lobos hit three out of six of their shots.

At this point in the contest, Mensah leads the Aztecs in points and rebounds, with 6 and 4, respectively. Matt Bradley is currently 2-7 from the field. He needs to get back in his groove if SDSU is going to dig out of this hole.

32-23, New Mexico.

7:00 remaining (under 8-minute timeout), SCORE: 26-21, New Mexico — After missing their first four shots from deep, Matt Bradley and Adam Seiko hit back-to-back threes for the Aztecs to stem the bleeding from New Mexico's run. On the flip side, the Lobos missed two threes and a midrange jumper — allowing SDSU to cut the lead to five.

Both teams have been sloppy at times with the ball so far: SDSU has four turnovers, while New Mexico has three.

8:42 remaining, SCORE: 22-15, New Mexico — Udeze went 1-2 from the line for the Lobos coming out of the media timeout. Mensah turned the ball over inside, and the Lobos responded with an easy mid-range jumper from Jamal Mashburn.

Mensah redeemed himself, finishing with nice touch using the left hand at the rim. Mashburn continued to get into a rhythm, as he nailed a three pointer next time down the court.

11:05 remaining (under 12-minute timeout) SCORE: 16-11, New Mexico — After going cold over several possessions, Darrion Trammell hit a much needed bucket to chip away at the Lobos lead. Although the Lobos connected on a string of shots, SDSU's defense stayed vigilant in order to force a shot clock violation on the next possession, slowing down the New Mexico run.

The Aztecs are 0-4 from three point land in this contest — and that has been the difference so far in this one. 16-11, New Mexico.

15:36 remaining (under 16-minute timeout) SCORE: 10-7, New Mexico — Nathan Mensah is making his presence felt on both end of the floors early in this one. Following an easy flush of a dunk inside thanks to a dime from Lamont Butler, Mensah blocked an hook shot jumper from Morris Udeze.

After Butler missed a jumper on the ensuing possession, New Mexico got too greedy and threw a pass down the court that sailed out of bounds. Three pointers have proven to be a boon early on for the Lobos.

17:33 remaining SCORE: 6-3, New Mexico — San Diego State loses the opening tip, and New Mexico misses a mid range jumper on their opening possession. Matt Bradley responds with an air ball. New Mexico threw the ball out of bounds on the following possession.

Off the turnover, Lamont Butler finds Keshad Johnson for an alley oop. Aztecs draw first blood: 2-0. New Mexico's Javont Johnson responds with a three-pointer.

Darrion Trammell goes 1-2 at the line to tie it up, but Johnson hit another three for the Lobos. 6-3, New Mexico.

GAME PREVIEW

The San Diego State Men's Basketball team is looking to stay in cruise control after securing their spot in the driver's seat atop the Mountain West standings. Tuesday's 74-65 victory over Nevada officially made SDSU the lone unbeaten team in the conference.

The New Mexico Lobos are looking to close the gap, especially since they started 2023 stumbling out of the gate. After going unbeaten in the 2022 portion of the season, the Lobos dropped back-to-back conference games against Fresno State and UNLV. Before Saturday's matchup, they bounced back against Oral Roberts.

SDSU's last loss came against St. Mary's on Dec. 10, 2022, but New Mexico managed to beat that common opponent, 69-65, at the end of November.

The Aztecs have ripped off six wins in a row since the L against St. Mary's — we'll see here soon whether they can extend their streak to seven wins.

Tip off is scheduled for 6 p.m., and the game will be broadcast on CBS Sports Network.

Follow along with our live blog, courtesy of digital producer Pat Mueller, to get minute-by-minute updates on the action from Viejas Arena.