Matt Bradley had 17 points and 10 rebounds for No. 23 San Diego State in a 74-65 win against visiting Nevada in a Mountain West Conference game on Tuesday.
Bradley came in averaging 22.7 points in conference play for the Aztecs (13-3, 4-0 MWC).
Lamont Butler added 15 points, Keshad Johnson had 11 points and three steals and Jaedon LeDee scored nine points off the bench for San Diego State, which rejoined the AP Top 25 this week after falling out of the rankings midway through last month.
Nick Davidson scored 17 points off the bench to lead Nevada (14-4, 4-1), which had won six in a row. Kenan Blackshear added 12 points and Jarod Lucas finished with 11 for the Wolf Pack.
The Aztecs never trailed after scoring the first 10 points of the game.
Johnson scored seven of the first 12 points for San Diego State to surpass his season average (6.9 points per game) entering play on Tuesday.
Nevada got back within six points at 14-8, but the Aztecs quickly pushed the lead to 25-12 on a jumper by Micah Parrish with 9:32 left in the first half.
San Diego shot 7-for-16 from 3-point range in the first half, including a 2-for-4 effort from Butler, whose second 3-pointer stretched the lead to 35-21 with 4:27 left in the half.
The Aztecs eventually took a 44-27 advantage into intermission.
Nevada threatened to get back within single digits early in the second half but wasn’t able to until the final minute.
The Wolf Pack scored seven of the first nine points in the second half to cut the lead to 46-34.
Butler’s three-point play with 12:58 left extended the lead back to 18. Nevada had another brief surge to get within 13 points on a 3-pointer by Davidson, but the Aztecs stormed back with a 9-0 run to move ahead 65-43 with 9:10 left.
Nevada made a final push with a 12-0 run to cut it to 71-62 with 48 seconds remaining.
San Diego State committed just two turnovers in the first half, but 10 in the second.
–Field Level Media