The ultimate destination for this Air Force basketball season remains entirely unknown, but it’s clear this squad is already enjoying the journey.
The Falcons took down Idaho State 89-82 on Sunday afternoon, and Kam Sanders’ celebration as he took possession in the closing seconds spoke to the level of fun this team is having in the first week of the season.
“I mean, how can you not get excited?” Sanders said, describing what he saw as an atmosphere where the fans and his Falcons teammates were energized and the team rallied to outscore the Bengals 48-40 in the second half. “You know, just feeding off that energy as a team, I feel like we did that well tonight. We fed off that energy and were able to come out with a big-time win.”
Idaho State (0-3) returned no starters and just two players on its roster as an extreme illustration of the current state of the game in the transfer portal era. The Bengals had opened the season with a 94-58 loss at Utah State and a 93-62 setback at Wyoming before coming to Clune Arena.
But Air Force, under new coach Joe Crispin and coming off a two-year stretch where it went 7-57, doesn’t need to nitpick opponent credentials at this point.
Instead, Cris...