Courtesy of Braidon Nourse

No. 8 San José State made its runs. No. 1 New Mexico just made bigger ones.

Lobos guard Donovan Dent proved why he’s the Mountain West player of the year, scoring a game-high 25 points and dishing out five assists. He’s tallied 20 or more points and at least five assists in five consecutive tournament games, becoming the first player in conference history to do so.

His biggest, or perhaps most emphatic bucket, was a buzzer-beating shot from around 40 feet to close out the first half.

After New Mexico guard Tru Washington earned a steal to set up a sideline out of bounds from half court, Dent took the rebound, turned quickly and fired a prayer. The backboard answered and slotted it home.

“It’s a credit to my team,” Dent said. “The five assists I can’t do without them. Being able to succeed in the ball screen was big to my 20 points.”

The first half of Thursday’s first quarterfinal was littered with runs both ways. The biggest were a San José State 11-0 run and a subsequent 13-0 run from the Lobos right before the first period came to a close.

They were punctuated by mistakes on both sides of the ball from players in both jerseys. According to Lobos coach Richard Pitino, all credit was due to the Spartans’ streaky and energetic start.

“They were physical. We definitely were missing a lot early. We were leaving a lot of points at the rim. Nelly was. I know he’s frustrated because he missed some shots,” Pitino said. “But there were some of them where he was worried about the refs. Just go dunk the ball.”

Eventually, that was quelled, and Dent took over with the help of forward Nelly Junior Joseph and Washington. Junior Joseph finished with 14 points on a 6-16 shooting performance, but added 18 rebounds, tied for the third-most all-time in a MW tournament game. Eight of them were on the offensive glass.

Washington turned it up in the second half, scoring seven of his 11 points in that period. He tied with three others for the game’s most steals with two and only turned it over once.

“Tru (Washington) did a lot of good things,” Pitino said. “It’s great to have that guy, put him on the ball, really, really disrupt and create some havoc.”

The top-seeded Lobos will face the winner of No. 4 San Diego State and No. 5 Boise State on Friday at 6:30 p.m. PT. The game will be broadcast on CBS Sports Network.