LARAMIE – Sundance Wicks arrived at his postgame press conference long after the season-high crowd of 4,556 had filed out of the Arena-Auditorium cloaked in brown, gold and disappointment.
 
It felt like Wyoming's head coach was stepping into a confessional to unburden himself of the team's sins or taking a seat on a psychologist's couch to plead for help in fixing the psyche of his Pokes.
 
UW's deflating 74-57 loss to San Diego State did not sit well with Wicks, who isn't just coaching anymore but trying to figure out how this collection of talent from around the globe can care about competing against the best teams in the Mountain West as much as he does.
 
"When we're met with force and we're met with toughness and we're met with a big challenge, we lack grit, we lack toughness, we lack heart and we lack the intangibles," Wicks said. "We have skill. We have character of good kids, but when it comes down to it, if you could bottle (heart) up and sell it, you'd be a millionaire. Ad nauseam, I've demanded and challenged this team to respond to the bigger and better opponents that we have to face, and we just have never been able to rise up to the occasion."
 
The Cowboys (11-6, 2-4) have lost to four of the top five teams – SDSU (12-4, 6-0), New Mexico (14-3, 5-1), Nevada (12-5, 4-2) and Grand Canyon (10-6, 3-2) – in the MW.
 
Wicks noted that his team won or held its own in many of the key statistical categories against the Aztecs. Both teams had 34 rebounds. UW had three more assists and two more made free throws than the visitors.
 
However, under the bright lights of facing a consistently excellent SDSU program three seasons removed from the national championship game, the Pokes shot a dim 30.9% from the field while allowing the visitors from sea level to make 50% of their shots at 7,220 feet.
 
Wicks' tone was not angry after the performance. He sounded exhausted from selling belief since June and still waiting for it to be purchased by this team.
 
"We've got some of the wrong pride in our locker room right now," Wicks said. "This has nothing to do with the type of young men that they are, but they believe that they can do it their way against better teams, and the right kind of pride is believing in something greater than yourself and being willing to sacrifice what you want for what the team needs when the team needs it."
 
Gavin Gores finished with 12 points on 5-for-8 shooting and eight rebounds to provide some resistance for the Pokes. Fellow true freshman Nasir (Naz) Meyer had 13 points but was just 4-for-14 from the field and senior point guard Leland Walker added 10 points, five assists and five rebounds.
 
You don't learn about a team when the shots are falling, which was the case for UW in the 98-66 win over UNLV in the previous home game. Wicks will learn a lot about his team based on how it responds to the unsettling setback against SDSU.
 
Speaking in parlance this generation of players can understand, Wicks said his staff is tired of being "ghosted" when trying to communicate the message of what it takes to beat the best teams in the conference.
 
The Pokes held a lengthy meeting without the coaches in the locker room as they face a crossroads entering this Saturday's game at Fresno State.
 
"Coach questioned our fight all season so far, and we haven't really shown up to his expectations. He believes that we can grow to that height, but we have to meet him there," senior forward Kiani Saxson said. "It hurts. You've got a lot of coaches that are sacrificing a lot of their family time. We know that they signed up for it, but we've got to realize that we've got coaches that are really sacrificing a lot for us and it's a privilege to play basketball.
 
"We've just got to acknowledge the sacrifice and actually buy into this. There can't be any more questioning our fight, it's got to change."
 
As Wicks stated, the Cowboys have character, skill and talent. They will need a shared heartbeat to move up the standings over the final 14 regular season games in the unforgiving MW.
 
Follow Ryan for more stories on Wyoming athletics on X at @By_RyanThorburn on Facebook at Wyoming Athletics and Instagram at wyoathletics. Also follow him at Pokes Insider at Gowyo.com/pokesinsider.
 
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