2006 Mountain West Conference Player of the Year Brandon Heath drilled home a well-defended three-pointer with the shot clock expiring and seven seconds left on the game clock to snap a 70-70 tie to propel his San Diego State Aztecs to a 74-70 win over the Missouri State Bears and dump MSU from the 70th MasterCard National Invitation Tournament in a first round NIT battle Wednesday night at Hammons Student Center in Springfield, Mo.

    Heath’s heroics capped a 26-point night and sent San Diego State to 22-10 for the season as the Aztecs advanced to a second-round matchup Monday night at Syracuse, a 79-73 home winner Wednesday over South Alabama. Missouri State saw its season closed with two straight losses and the Bears ended their campaign at 22-11.

    In a game that was filled with scoring swings and saw five ties and eight lead changes, Missouri State’s Deven Mitchell hit two free throws with 2:18 to play and hit two more with 41 seconds left to bring the Bears back from a 70-66 deficit and the game’s last deadlock. SDSU called time out, ran the clock down and let Heath fire in the winner from the deep left wing in front of the Aztecs’ bench. The Aztecs then fouled the Bears before MSU could attempt a game-tying three.

    San Diego State expanded a 34-29 halftime lead to eight points at 44-36 with 15:14 to play. The Bears fought back as two threes from Blake Ahearn and a trey from Tyler Chaney sparked an 11-1 run that put MSU in front 47-45 with 12:59 left. The Bears snapped a 49-49 tie and moved ahead 58-53 on a trey by Shane Laurie and expanded the advantage to 60-54 on a bucket by Nathan Bilyeu with 7:26 remaining.

    A three by Heath triggered a 9-0 run by the Aztecs that overlapped a crucial missed free throw by Ahearn on the front end of a 1-and-1 with 5:42 to play and the Bears trailing 61-60. The miss prevented the Bears from retaking the lead and would be the final free throw of Ahearn’s Missouri State career. The senior guard, the NCAA Division I free throw percentage leader three years in a row, finished at .946 (435-of-460) from the foul line for his career and will graduate with the Division I career percentage record from the charity stripe.

    A bucket by Bilyeu got MSU back to within 63-62 but Heath and Jerome Habel both scored to push the Aztecs back up by five at 67-62 with four minutes left. A dunk and then two free throws by Drew Richards pulled the Bears to within 70-66 and set the stage for Mitchell’s free throws to get Missouri State its last tie.

    The Bears got off to a quick start and built an eight-point lead at 24-16 twelve minutes into the game but SDSU fashioned its first big scoring run with an 18-5 burst that pushed the Aztecs in front 34-29 at halftime.

    Heath got scoring help from Mohamed Abukar with 15 and Habel with 11 before each fouled out in the final minute of the game. Mitchell hit 12-of-14 from the foul line and led Missouri State with 16 points while Ahearn and Richards scored 15 each. Ahearn’s three treys pushed his total for the year to 94 to tie the school single season mark set by Johnny Murdock in 1992-93. Ahearn had earlier broken Murdock’s career mark and finished with 276 three-pointers. Ahearn’s final season point total of 509 made him the ninth Missouri State player with two 500-point seasons and his final career figure of 1,677 points put him seventh on the all-time MSU point list.

    The Bears’ other two seniors also finished in the Bears’ all-time scoring top 30. Chaney’s five points Wednesday closed him at 957 for 112 MSU games while Bilyeu scored six to leave his final total at 939 in 124 games. Bilyeu matched his season high of 10 rebounds to close at 628 for his career, 15th all-time, while Chaney’s lone three in the contest was his 114th as a Bear, breaking a tie with Allen Phillips and leaving Chaney fifth all-time. The trio combined for 365 games, 260 starting assignments, 3,573 points, 418 threes, 983 free throws, 1,269 rebounds, 739 assists and 312 steals.