Cowboys bounce back with 85-62 blowout win over Fresno State

Feb. 1—LARAMIE — It's always a good sign when a college basketball team is able to give one of its walk-on players a few minutes in the spotlight.

That was the case for University of Wyoming guard Cort Roberson on Tuesday night against Fresno State. With the Cowboys leading the Bulldogs by 21 points in the Arena-Auditorium, Roberson checked in for just the second time this season.

He scored his second and third career points at the free-throw line with 37 seconds remaining to help lift the Cowboys to a 85-62 victory.

"It's always nice to see walk-ons get their shining moment," forward Hunter Thompson said after the game. "Cort deserves it. He does a great job giving us a good look in scout. It's not like he's like, 'I'm just a scout player,' he comes in and gets a lot of work in by himself. I'm very happy for him."

Roberson didn't just get into the box score on offense. On the Bulldogs' final possession, the 6-foot, 157-pound redshirt freshman blocked a layup from Fresno State's Alexander Gorton to help seal the win.

"If you would have said, 'Hey, what are the chances of him getting a block?' I would have probably said slim to none," UW coach Jeff Linder joked. "I would have said when hell froze over, but shoot man, Laramie is already frozen over."

Roberson helped put the finishing touches on a dominant win that pushed UW to 7-14 overall and 2-7 in the Mountain West. The Cowboys led for nearly 38 minutes against the Bulldogs, who fell to 7-14 and 3-7 with the loss.

The Cowboys avenged a 58-53 loss to Fresno State in December, due in large part to out-rebounding the Bulldogs 45-22. UW deployed its 15th different starting lineup Tuesday, a mark that leads the country.

Jeremiah Oden, Hunter Thompson and Nate Barnhart joined Noah Reynolds and Hunter Maldonado in the starting five, a unit that helped UW outscore the Bulldogs 47-25 in the first half. Forward Caden Powell also contributed three minutes in a reserve role in the paint coming off the bench.

"Big is good if you can play good," Linder said. "It's not a matter of being big, but it's the effort that's required. I thought those guys' effort was really good. I thought Caden's effort was really good in terms of the minutes that he played."

The Cowboys led by as much as 25 points early in the second half, but allowed the Bulldogs to get back to within 14 with less than five minutes left to play. UW was able to outscore Fresno State 14-5 down the stretch to hold onto the double-digit win.

"Sometimes, when you get up 25, you have to be mature enough to continue," Linder said. "You're also playing a team that has good players. (Jemari Baker Jr.) has the ability to make tough shots and (Isaiah) Hill has the ability to make tough shots. Based off of where we've been and what we've done, I'm not going to complain about winning by 20-some points."

The Cowboys played 11 guys against the Bulldogs, the most since conference play started in December. UW has been one of the most injury-riddled teams in the country, but is almost back to full strength with the return of Brendan Wenzel on Tuesday.

After losing 13 of its past 17 games, UW now has just two players on the injured reserve list in Kenny Foster (back) and Graham Ike (lower right leg).

"It's a long year," Linder said. "You can either decide to feel sorry for yourself and say, 'It's too tough,' and pack it in, or you can keep trying to get better and keep building knowing that, at any point in time, momentum is a funny thing and confidence is a funny thing. You start putting a couple (wins) together, and things can start to change in a hurry."

The Cowboys shot 29-of-57 (51%) from the field and 13-of-28 (46%) from 3-point range. UW finished with 30 points in the paint and 13 offensive rebounds with help of its bigger lineup.

"Our effort had to exceed theirs knowing they had a tough trip here and having to play at altitude," Linder said. "Can we be the team, over the course of 40 minutes, that just has more effort? You're going to see that in terms of offensive rebounding. I think they ended up missing 37 shots and they didn't get very many offensive rebounds off of those. For us to go get 13 offensive rebounds, that was a big part of us adjusting the starting lineup."

Thompson had a big night, leading the team with 18 points to go along with eight rebounds. Oden put together a double-double, scoring 15 points and grabbing 10 boards.

"I challenged (Oden)," Linder said. "If he wants to play, he's going to have to rebound. He goes out there and gets a double-double."

Maldonado had a season-high eight assists for the Cowboys, which pushed him into second-place on the all-time MW list with 583 in his career. Fresno State was led by Hill's 11 points, followed by 10 from Baker Jr. and Isaih Moore.

The Cowboys built a lot of momentum with the lopsided win, Linder said. At the midway point in conference play, UW moved into 10th place out of 11 teams in the standings, one spot ahead of Colorado State.

"Even though we're having the season we're having, we still believe we can beat anyone in this league," Thompson said. "It's a great win for us. We've just got to take one game and put it into the next game. That's all we're focused on right now."

It's been a long time since Linder had a big enough lead to give Roberson some playing time. It was satisfying for the third-year coach to be able to reward Roberson for his hard work in practice.

"Those are the types of guys who are invaluable," Linder said. "Sometimes people don't see it because he's sitting at the end of the bench, but he's invaluable in what we do. ... He wants to try and prove that at some point, he can play here. You can't fault somebody like that. Those are the types of kids that you want in your program."

For Oden, Roberson's playing time was something he has more than earned with his energy and passion every day in practice for the Cowboys.

"It means a ton because Cort is one of those dudes, he's kind of like the heart of soul of our program just with what he comes in and does every day," Oden said. "It doesn't necessarily show up to the public, but we know how big of an impact he has. So for him to get into the game, hit a couple free throws, get a block, that's as good as the win to me."

The Cowboys will hit the road for a matchup with San Jose State this weekend. The Spartans will host UW at 8 p.m. Saturday in California.

"We've won two out of the last three, which we haven't been able to say that in a while," Linder said.

WYOMING 85, FRESNO STATE 62

Fresno State: Baker Jr. 3-9 3-3 10, Hill 4-6 2-2 11, 3-8 2-2 9, Holland 0-1 0-0 0, Colimerio 3-8 2-2 9, Andre 2-6 2-3 6, Yap 3-9 0-0 8, Gorton 0-1 0-0 0, Campbell 1-3 0-0 2, Moore 4-9 2-4 10, Whitaker 2-4 0-0 6, Vasquez 0-2 0-0 0. Totals: 22-58 11-14.

Wyoming: Thompson 6-10 2-2 18, Barnhart 4-7 2-2 12, Reynolds 4-10 0-0 9, Maldonado 5-7 3-3 14, Oden 5-8 3-3 15, Wenzel 0-2 0-0 0, Kyman 1-3 0-0 3, Anderson 3-3 2-2 9, Roberson 0-1 2-2 2, Powell 0-2 0-0 0, DuSell 1-4 0-0 3. Totals: 29-57 14-14.

Halftime: Wyoming 47-25. 3-pointers: UW 13-28 (Thompson 4-8, Barnhart 2-3, Reynolds 1-3, Maldonado 1-2, Oden 2-3, Wenzel 0-1, Kyman 1-3, Anderson 1-1, DuSell 1-4); FSU 7-25 (Baker Jr. 1-4, Hill 1-1, Colimerio 1-4, Holland 0-1, Yap 2-7, Campbell 0-2, Moore 0-1, Whitaker 2-4, Vasquez 0-1). Rebounds: UW 45 (Oden 10), FSU 22 (Colimerio 6). Assists: UW 17 (Maldonado 8), FSU 13 (Hill 7). Turnovers: UW 18 (Maldonado 4), FSU 6 (Moore 2). Blocks: UW 5 (Barnhart 2), FSU 1 (Campbell 1). Steals: FSU 11 (Baker Jr. 4), UW 2 (Maldonado 2). Team fouls: UW 20, FSU 17.

Attendance: 3,950.

Alex Taylor covers the University of Wyoming for WyoSports. He can be reached at ataylor@wyosports.net or 269-364-3560. Follow him on Twitter at @alex_m_taylor22.