Kevin Lytle | Fort Collins Coloradoan

LAS VEGAS — Nico Carvacho stared off into the distance.

Stunned.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

The Colorado State basketball team came to the Mountain West tournament with an exciting team that surrounded the senior Carvacho with tons of young talent.

The Rams performed above expectations most of the season. A week ago, they nearly upset No. 5 San Diego State on the road.

They seemed fully capable of being dangerous in this week's conference tournament.

Then it all came crashing down.

After the buzzer sounded on an 80-74 loss to bottom-feeder Wyoming on Wednesday, Carvacho looked nonplussed.

"Yeah, it took a little while to walk off," Carvacho said. "Five years of being here and playing in this time, the conference tournament, you've got to take it in a little bit. Definitely hasn't hit me yet, but I think it's going to."

Here are three thoughts on the loss, CSU’s third straight first-round MW tournament exit.

Wyoming always stepped up

The No. 11 Cowboys (8-23) started the game on first from 3-point land, hitting five of its first six and quickly building a double-digit lead in the first half.

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The start of the second half played out in similar manner, with Wyoming going on a 9-1 run.

CSU (20-12) pulled together a run in the middle of each half to get right back in the game. But Wyoming always responded.

Three times in the game the Rams cut the deficit down to two points and each time Wyoming hit a 3-pointer.

“There’s a ton of emotion with these guys right now. I know they’re gutted with this loss," coach Niko Medved said. "Too many key turnovers in situations when we had a chance."

The final dagger was when CSU had an 11-0 surge to get to a 53-51 deficit before Kwane Marble hit a 3-pointer. It was 56-54 Wyoming moments later, when Marble hit another 3-pointer to spark a 13-2 run to bury the Rams.

CSU's struggles bounced between each end of the court, but something was always holding the Rams back.

"I thought the issue in the first half was our defense, in the second half it was our offense," Medved said. "I thought we really turned the ball over in a lot of key situations."

CSU, playing the foul-and-score game, cut it to 74-71 with 31 seconds left. Then 77-74 with 17 seconds left, but never had a possession with a chance to tie it in the final minute.

Wyoming's story all season was threatening upsets, but finding ways to collapse. It didn't happen this time. Marble was shooting 29% from deep on the season but hit four of seven attempts in this one for a team-high 20 points.

Bad showing

CSU will be hugely disappointed with an overall bad game. The Rams weren’t good enough for long stretches on defense and the offense was disjointed.

Outside the stats, CSU failed to make a key play at the most decisive moments.

The Rams needed more from their depth. Carvacho did his part with 20 points and 12 rebounds for his 49th career double-double. Isaiah Stevens posted 22 points. But no one else stepped up as needed in the scoring department. CSU shot 40% for the game and turned it over 16 times compared to just seven for the Cowboys.

Time will tell how the young players respond to this, but it was another bad night in Las Vegas, as UNLV also routed the Rams in the same arena last month.

CSU went down by 19 in the second half at Wyoming in February and managed a rally to win. This upset wasn't a case of CSU expecting to cruise past the Cowboys, the Rams just did not execute again.

This time, the deficit was too much.

Hard to swallow

The big picture of the 2019-20 season is still that CSU had a successful season. Twenty wins is more than most would have predicted, same with 11 conference wins.

The signs of a very bright future for CSU are obvious.

But that does nothing for Wednesday night. Plainly put, it was a bad loss against a bad team. Forget that it’s hard to beat a team for a third time in a row in a season, probably even more so for a rival.

A team that wants to be in the upper tier of the Mountain West can’t lose to a seven-win team with just two conference wins at the most important time of the season.

Want more salt in that wound? Wyoming is the first No. 11 seed to win a game in MW tournament history.

CSU sat in second place in the conference during the second week of February but didn't even make it to the second day of the the conference tournament. That's a sour note to end the Mountain West campaign any way you slice it.