Optimism Abounds, San Diego State Basketball Holds First Official Practice Of The Season

"Always an exciting time!"

That's what San Diego State men's basketball head coach Brian Dutcher said just moments before his Aztecs team took the court at Viejas Arena for their first official practice of the 2022-23 season.

This year the excitement around the Aztecs program is higher than normal.

Why so much excitement?

Well this teams roster is loaded, it returns 4 starters from last seasons 23-9 team, has a slew of key reserves returning and added 3 highly skilled transfers. Even more exciting, that talented roster will face a challenging schedule.

"You look at what you have coming back, what you're going to put on the floor and you schedule accordingly," said Dutcher. " Obviously, we think we're going to be pretty good, so we've challenged ourselves with maybe one of the hardest schedules we've ever played here."

San Diego State currently has scheduled games against BYU, Stanford, St. Mary's and Ohio State. Depending on how certain tournaments play out, other teams SDSU might play include Arizona, Cincinnati, Texas Tech, Louisville, Arkansas and Creighton.

"It's murderers row, but that's what we've chosen to play. No one has forced us to play that schedule, it's what we want to do and we are excited by that challenge."

While they're excited by the challenge the schedule will bring, there's plenty of challenges to deal with before the games even begin. First and foremost, playing time. Deciding which players will start and be in the rotation will be a challenge for the Aztecs coaching staff.

"I say with our roster it's a players dilemma and a coaches delight. We have a lot of players, I'm going to have a hard time finding minutes for everyone."

So how is Dutcher going to find minutes for everyone? How is he going to decide who starts, who plays and who sits?

Obviously, practices and team scrimmages will influence all decisions on playing time. With that in mind and so many talented players pushing for time on the floor, Dutcher said competition at practice can be intense.

"I told them, the best thing we can do is not hurt one another. They compete so hard that if a guy gets a layup I say just give them the layup, don't try to win a drill at the expense of hurting a teammate. So I have to back them off a little bit competition-wise."

The strong competition for playing time will continue throughout the season, and that's how Dutcher likes it.

"When we recruit, we don't promise anything other than opportunity. We don't promise starting minutes, so now it's up to the players to seize what opportunities are out there."

Matt Bradley, Nathan Mensah, Keshad Johnson, Lamont Butler, Adam Seiko, Aguek Arop headline the returning players, while transfers Darrion Trammel, Micah Parrish and Jaedon Lee are all expected to have big impacts on the program.

Lot's of individual talent, but Dutcher said the key to success is building that team concept.

"We have a lot of talent, now we have to put it together. These guys are wired the right way, they want to win more than anything else. We should be very dangerous this year."

San Diego State plays San Diego Christian in an exhibition November 1st. The Aztecs then tip off the regular season November 7th at Viejas Arena against Cal State Fullerton.