BYU basketball: How BYU fell short in WCC semifinal loss to to Saint Mary’s

LAS VEGAS — Fittingly, BYU and Saint Mary’s played one final memorable West Coast Conference game against each other. 

And it was more like two games in one.

For the first 25 minutes of Monday’s WCC tournament semifinal, the top-seeded Gaels put on a don’t-let-the-door-hit-you-on-the-way-out performance, surging to a 26-point lead. Saint Mary’s was eviscerating the No. 5 seeded Cougars. 

It was not the way BYU wanted to leave the WCC — not on a bitterly sour note like that.

But over the final 15 minutes, the Cougars staged a furious rally, cutting the deficit to three points with 32 seconds remaining. 

In the end, though, No. 16 ranked Saint Mary’s held off BYU 76-69 at Orleans Arena. 

“It’s who our guys have been all year,” Cougar coach Mark Pope said about his team’s resilience and refusal to quit. “I’m completely unsurprised. I’m just disappointed.”

The Gaels advanced to the WCC tournament championship game Tuesday. 

As for BYU? Its season is likely over.

One last time, Saint Mary’s (26-6) administered pain to the Cougars (19-15), denying them their 20th win of the season and keeping them out of the WCC title game. And they also snapped BYU’s modest three-game winning streak. 

Still, over the final 15 minutes, the Cougars did not go down quietly.

“You don’t want to have to try to beat BYU a third time. They’re pretty talented and they just won two games in this tournament. It was a tough game,” said Saint Mary’s coach Randy Bennett. “We played well the first 25 minutes and then we lost focus a little bit. We picked up a technical and things like that. They got some momentum and we gave them some hope.”

Things started badly for the Cougars — a double-digit deficit at the midway point of the first half and a 17-point deficit at halftime — and just got worse early in the second half.  

BYU dug a deep hole and spent most of the night trying to climb its way out. 

The tone for this one was set early — the Cougars missed six of its first seven shots. The Gaels were getting high-percentage layups and made everything difficult for BYU. 

As usual, Saint Mary’s got into passing lanes, created deflections, played physical, and generally made the Cougars look like they were stuck in mud.

“We were a little bit paralyzed defensively, surprisingly for us. I can’t even tell you exactly why. There’s 100 different reasons,” Pope said. “Two super emotional days back-to-back, the anticipation of the opportunity that was in front of us, maybe the respect for Saint Mary’s and how they are … Somehow, we couldn’t find our emotional well early in the game. On the offensive side, our Achilles’ heel has been when we get stagnant. We got stagnant. Credit Saint Mary’s for a lot of that.”

The Gaels held a 37-20 lead at intermission. BYU shot 30%, compared to 50% for Saint Mary’s in the first half. 

Early in the second half, the Gaels kept their…