Mountain West Basketball: Final power rankings for 2019-20 season

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - MARCH 07: Sam Merrill #5 of the Utah State Aggies is names MVP after defeating the San Diego State Aztecs to win the championship game of the Mountain West Conference basketball tournament at the Thomas & Mack Center on March 7, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Aggies defeated the Aztecs 59-56. (Photo by Joe Buglewicz/Getty Images) /

10 of 11

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA – MARCH 07: Sam Merrill #5 of the Utah State Aggies (Photo by Joe Buglewicz/Getty Images) /

2. Utah State (-)

Utah State did everything in their power to finally get themselves back into the top spot in this conference, but it unfortunately wasn’t enough to overtake the conference’s regular-season champions. However, they absolutely did enough to strengthen their grip on the #2 spot in the conference.

There was a stretch at the end of the season where Utah State looked absolutely unstoppable against any of the conference’s mortals. They won 9 of 10 in that stretch and seemingly did so without breaking much of a sweat in the nine wins. The one loss in there happened to be a road trip to San Diego. Then that stretch ended with a loss at a New Mexico team who had dealt with nothing but trouble all year. It seemed like that was a bad omen heading into the Mountain West tournament.

Then the Aggies became that unstoppable team again. It started a little bit shakily with them barely edging out New Mexico in the conference tournament’s second round. From there, they truly got their act together. They never trailed against the tournament’s shocking Cinderella story, Wyoming, in the semifinals. Then they took on the conference’s regular-season champs.

They got punched in the mouth in the first half, going into the break down by eight points. In the second half, they turned things around and a Sam Merrill 3 gave Utah State their second consecutive Mountain West tournament title.

Some might think that should give them the top spot in the final power rankings, but I just can’t bring myself to give Utah State the top spot based on that win. SDSU holds wins over them in two other games this season and only lost twice in conference play all year.

Utah State would have been a very interesting team in the NCAA tournament because they seemed to be getting hot at the right time and Sam Merrill looked ready to take over games in the tournament. Unfortunately, we didn’t get the chance to see what they could do in the tournament and that means they’ll have to settle for the conference tournament title and a 2nd place finish in the conference power rankings.