LAS VEGAS — The four-sided video board hanging from the ceiling in Mandalay Bay’s Michelob Ultra Arena shows the score, time, period and a variety of team and individual statistics, along with a live feed of the action.
During timeouts, though, it switches to advertisements and crowd shots. The numbers go away.
Mercifully, it turns out, for San Diego State’s basketball team, saving it from having to look at them.
The Aztecs’ showdown with No. 7-ranked Michigan was a game for exactly four minutes, which was how look it took one of the best college rosters NIL can buy to erase an early deficit and shift into overdrive en route to a dominant, convincing, emphatic, unequivocal 94-54 victory on the opening night of the 18-team Players Era Festival.
Or put more succinctly: The Aztecs got taken to the woodshed.
It is their second straight lopsided outcome in as many games against college basketball’s storied programs. Last March in the NCAA Tournament’s First Four, they trailed North Carolina by 40 and lost by 27. Monday night: trailed by 42 and lost by 40.
Counting the final two games of last season, losses in the Mountain West and NCAA tournaments, a program that played in the 2023 national championship game is 2-4 in its last six outings.
The competition gets easier Tuesday night at 8 p.m., when the Aztecs face an Oregon team that is No. 66 in the Kenpom metric and turned it over 18 times Monday in an 83-72 loss to Auburn. But even that might not be enough for an SDSU team that was billed as one of the best in school history and has suddenly, inexplicably lost its way just four games into the season.
Michigan guard L.J. Cason (2) is pressured by San Diego State guard Taj Degourville (24) and San Diego State forward Pharaoh Compton, left, during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Las Vegas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Michigan coach Dusty May is good friends with counterpart Brian Dutcher, but there was little sympathy in a tournament format where teams are paying for additional dollars beyond the $1 million guaranteed per team and a key tiebreaker to reach the money round is points differential. The Wolverines kept running, kept scoring, kept the hammer down.
By the middle of the second half, bored Michigan fans turned their attention to their hated rival back in the Midwest, chanting: “Beat Ohio.”
Magoon Gwath moved into the starting lineup, and Miles Heide returned to it after tweaking an ankle in practice before the last game. But that made little difference to the Wolverines, who simply went over, around and through them.
The two bright spots for SDSU on an otherwise dreary night both came off the bench, freshman Elzie Harrington and junior BJ Davis. They combined for 26 points on a night when the starters managed only seven, five, five, four and zero points.
Gwath followed a 20-point, seven-rebound, three-block performance in his season debut last week with seven points (2 of 8 shooting), two rebounds, five turnovers and no blocks in 20 minutes. Leading scorers Reese Dixon-Waters and Miles Byrd had five points each on a combined 3 of 15 shooting.
Michigan had six players in double figures, all between 10 and 13. The damage was in the collective, outshooting the Aztecs 50% to 27.4%, outrebounding them 49-34, outscoring them 38-12 in the paint and posting a 22-3 edge in second-chance points off offensive boards.
San Diego State forward Jeremiah Oden (25) drives to the basket past Michigan center Malick Kordel (32) during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game in Las Vegas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
About the only victory of the night for the Aztecs was a first-half coach’s video challenge that overturned a goaltending call.
Six days after falling behind Troy 14-2 in what ultimately was a double overtime loss, the Aztecs appeared to learn their lesson and did this in their first two possessions: a driving layup by Taj DeGourville, followed by a step-back 3 by Byrd, giving them a 5-0 lead and, above all, hope.
Then Michigan did this: a 17-2 run in which the Aztecs missed seven of eight shots and had two turnovers.
The margin would balloon to 17 midway through the first half as the Wolverines dominated the boards – on one possession, they had four volleyball tips at the rim before one finally dropped – and the Aztecs settled for mid-range contested jumpers in the lane, the absolute worst percentage shot in basketball if you listen to the analytics gurus.
But then Dutcher inserted Harrington at the point, his third choice after DeGourville struggled to penetrate off ball screens and had two early turnovers and backup Sean Newman Jr. got two quick fouls.
Michigan players celebrate a score against San Diego State during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game in Las Vegas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Harrington plays with a confident serenity and seemed to calm the teetering Aztecs, scoring nine of his team’s final 12 points of the half. Several came off high ball screens, where Harrington made the Wolverines pay for their drop coverage with on-balance jumpers. When they went under the screen, he drained a 3. He finished with 15 points on 6 of 9 shooting.
That made it a more respectable 45-33 at intermission, and it would have been closer had the Aztecs not missed three good looks in the closing seconds against Michigan’s zone.
Still, 35 points in the opening 20 minutes wasn’t bad against a team ranked fifth nationally in defensive efficiency. The problem was at the other end, where an Aztecs defense that was shredded by Troy’s 5-out offense did no better against the big, burly Wolverines, who scored at a higher rate than Troy (1.216 points per possession) in the first half.
The problem in the second half became both ends of the floor. By the time the Aztecs scored, they were down 20.
By the time they cracked 40 points, they were down 27.
Soon, it was, gulp, in the 40s.