Those who follow the local junior college basketball scene are probably having a tough time picking this year's biggest surprise.
Is it the fact that Southern Idaho will not be going to the national championship for just the second time in a decade? Or, would it be that Utah Valley State College will be making its first-ever trip to the NJCAA tourney?Don't tell the Wolverines, but it's probably the latter.
It's not that UVSC doesn't deserve a spot among the best JUCO teams in the country this year, because the club from Orem definitely does.
Utah Valley has already proven that with a sparkling 29-4 record, a No. 5 national ranking, a Scenic West Athletic Conference regular-season title and a Region 18 Tournament championship.
The almost baffling part, though, is how the Wolverines did it.
Coming into the season, they had only two players returning from last year's squad which went 22-10. And those two - Scott Benson and Paul Sonnenberg - were reserves.
Even with an inexperienced lineup - which includes nine freshmen - the Wolverines were able to get off to a great start. They jumped out to an overall record of 17-2 and built a three-game lead midway through the SWAC race.
That was the easy part, though.
Benson, a 6-6 forward from Taylorsville, was 19 games into his super sophomore season when he broke his leg in the final seconds against Snow.
Gone for the season was the Wolverines leading scorer (20.2 points a game) and top rebounder (7.5 rpg).
Still, UVSC didn't lose hope - or many games for that matter.
"Everyone kind of picked it up," said second-year coach Jeff Reinert. "Everyone's been able to fill the void."
The biggest thing that helped the Wolverines, said Reinert, was their depth. Even before Benson's accident, they had been using a rotation about 10-deep.
"Everyone had played minutes that weren't just scrap minutes, they were important minutes," said Reinert, the former BYU assistant coach. "When Scott went down everyone just played normal and didn't need to do anything extraordinary."
To point, even minus Benson, the Wolverines still have four players who score in double figures.
Leading the team are freshman Brad Willden, a 6-5 forward from Alta, with 16.6 points 7.5 rebounds, and sophomore point guard Derrick Elliott, who scores 15.7 with six assists a game. Another Alta product, freshman Brent Hawkins, scores 11 a game and Danny Brotherson of Mesquite, Nev., averages 10 points.
"We had great chemistry on this team and that helped us a lot," said Willden, who along with Hawkins, was a Deseret News first team all-stater last year. "We had to really come together (when Scott broke his leg). No one thought we were going to be able to do it, but we said, 'hey, we've got to follow Scott's example because he always worked his butt off.' So went out and worked twice as hard to prove everybody wrong."
Their success has even surprised Reinert a bit.
"We thought we could have a chance to host the tournament," he said, "but we never thought we would win the conference championship. We wanted to, but it was more of a secondary goal - it wasn't the No. 1 thing . . . "To go to Hutch is a bonus."
Utah Valley will take on the Sullivan (Kent.) College Executives in the first round of the 16-team tournament Tuesday night at 5 p.m. MST. The game will be broadcast live on KSTR-AM 1400.