Boise State coach Leon Rice is doing all he can to avoid the proverbial ‘trap game’ Tuesday night at Air Force.
His first way? By not even talking about it.
The Broncos, fresh off two home wins, hit the road to play at Air Force on Tuesday before maybe their biggest game of the season Friday night at first place San Diego State.
“We don’t even know who we play next after this,” Rice said Monday. “We have one mission right now and that’s it.”
The scenario would seem prime for a letdown. The Broncos are a better team than Air Force and are expected to win the game, but the Falcons are much better than in previous years and typically play well at home.
Boise State also is dealing with college kids who know they’ll be in sunny San Diego by Wednesday afternoon ahead of the showdown with No. 22 San Diego State later this week.
The Broncos, who are rolling and enter the game with a 17-5 record and a 7-2 mark in Mountain West play, have also traditionally struggled at Air Force. They are just 4-5 at Clune Arena dating back to 2013.
“You’re going to fight human nature on things but you have to fight it,” Rice said about not looking ahead. “The maturity of these guys that have been to these places and played in these games, they know I’m not just making up stories about ‘well this is a hard place to play and this is a hard system and this is a good team.’
“They aren’t dumb that way. They are like, ‘wow, yeah we know (this will be a tough game).’ So that’s the message and that’s what these guys have done a great job at.”
Air Force (12-10, 3-6 MW) is having one of its best seasons in years under coach Joe Scott. The Falcons already hold league wins over Colorado State, Fresno State and Wyoming and played both New Mexico and San Diego State tough.
The Falcons, who at No. 157 are on pace for their best finish at KenPom since 2013 when they were 99th, run the famed Princeton offense in which they use multiple screens and cuts on each possession while taking up most of the 30-second shot clock.
Air Force is No. 352 of 363 D-1 teams in terms of average possession length.
“It’s a tough team to prepare for in a short period of time,” Rice said. “I thought they were terrific in their last game against New Mexico.
“You have altitude, you have a team that is tempo wise one of the slowest in the country, they make you guard, and they have a system they stick with and they know their system and that makes it tough.”
Boise State is a game back of San Diego State for first place in the league standings. The Broncos are also pushing towards a second-straight at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
A win Tuesday is needed for both.
The bigger game comes Friday, but it won’t mean as much if the Broncos can’t beat Air Force first.
“We know that a road game in the Mountain West against a team that runs their stuff as good as anybody in the country, it’s going to be tough,” Rice said.
Tip off is set for 7 p.m. and the game will stream on the Mountain West Network.