Dedan Thomas Jr. broke a tie with a step-back jumper with 18 seconds left and UNLV held on to upset No. 21 San Diego State 62-58 in the Mountain West Conference matchup on Tuesday night in Las Vegas.
Thomas scored 19 points and Keylan Boone had 16 points, 11 rebounds and four blocks for UNLV (19-10, 12-5 MWC), which has won five in a row 10 of 11.
Elijah Saunders scored 14 points off the bench and Jaedon LeDee had 12 points and seven rebounds for the Aztecs (22-8, 11-6), who finished 3-6 on the road in conference play.
UNLV went nearly four minutes without scoring to start the second half, but the Aztecs started slowly as well, giving the Rebels time to find their touch and extend the lead back to double digits at 40-30.
Saunders made back-to-back 3-pointers to cut the deficit to 42-38, and Miles Byrd sank a third straight trey for the Aztecs to trim it to 42-41, but the 9-0 run stalled there.
UNLV scored the next five points and then scored five straight again after San Diego State had cut it to two to extend the lead to 56-49 with 3:53 left.
LeDee missed two free throws with 1:53 left, but Lamont Butler hit a 3-pointer with 1:08 left to trim it to 58-56 and then had a steal and layup to tie it 58-58 with 44 seconds to go.
The Aztecs got off to a slow start offensively and didn’t score their first points until Luis Rodriguez was called for a flagrant 1 foul on LeDee, who made two free throws to cut UNLV’s lead to 6-2 with 15:03 left in the half.
San Diego State was 0-for-12 from the field when Reese Waters sank a 3-pointer from the baseline to trim the lead to 12-5, but Justin Webster answered with a four-point play to extend the lead back to double figures at 16-5.
Boone made a high-arcing 3-pointer from the baseline with 8:13 left in the half to give the Rebels their biggest lead at 27-10, but UNLV went nearly 7 1/2 minutes without a field goal and the Aztecs were able to cut the lead to 31-28 on a 3-pointer from the corner from Micah Parrish with 1:44 remaining.
Rob Whaley Jr. ended the field-goal drought with 46 seconds to go and UNLV took a 33-28 lead into the break.
–Field Level Media