During my last SR2 game, the newest player pointed out that the Toxic Wave spell cast at the party could not be resisted with the assistance of the party mage's Spell Defense dice, pointing out that in SR2 p129, it notes that the Spell Resistance test is treated as a ranged combat damage resistance test.

Whoah! Have we been playing this wrong for all these decades?

AFAIK (I haven't read SR2) all that text means is that you use Dodge resist rather than a Willpower resist. The counterspelling (spell defense) still applies.