The Fresno State men’s basketball team will miss its chance to even the score with the Utah State Aggies on Saturday night.
The Bulldogs’ second game with the Aggies is postponed “due to health and safety concerns,” according to the Mountain West (MW) Saturday afternoon. The conference said further updates and schedule adjustments will be made at a later date.
This is now the seventh Fresno State men’s basketball game postponed due to COVID-19 concerns, and the second postponed contest for the Bulldogs in MW play.
Fresno State had its first postponement of the season against Pacific on Nov. 27, when the Tigers could not receive their COVID-19 test results prior to tip-off.
Four more non-conference games were postponed for the Bulldogs in late November and early December, due to multiple positive COVID-19 cases within the Fresno State men’s basketball program.
A positive test within the Boise State men’s basketball program, which the university later announced was a false positive test, cost Fresno State the second game of a series against the rival Broncos.
The Boise State postponement is similar in one way to Saturday’s — both came after a Bulldog loss in the series’ first game. Fresno State fell to Utah State 69-53 Thursday night, after only trailing by five at the first media timeout of the second half.
Fresno State (7-7, 5-7 MW) now looks ahead to a two-game series next week against Air Force in Colorado Springs, followed by two games at home against San Diego State and finally two more at UNLV to end the regular season schedule.
Fresno State’s final scheduled regular-season game is on Feb. 26, and the first round of the MW men’s basketball tournament begins on March 10. Therefore, Fresno State could choose to reschedule its games against Utah State or Boise State during the week-long gap in between.
As for the Bulldogs’ postponed games from November and December — against Pacific, UC Riverside, Cal State Northridge, Cal Poly and Pepperdine — it remains to be seen if those are either played or canceled.
