Utah could have found excuses aplenty if it didn’t play well in Thursday’s season and Pac-12 opening men’s basketball game at the empty Huntsman Center, with COVID-19 restrictions making the contest feel more like a closed scrimmage than a real, tension-packed conference game.
But 2019-20 returnees Timmy Allen, Rylan Jones, Alfonso Plummer and Branden Carlson would have none of that thinking.
With an assist from exciting newcomer Pelle Larsson and a deeper, more defensive-minded bench, the Utes took care of business and then some in strolling past Washington 76-62.
“It’s Game One in a marathon,” said coach Larry Krystkowiak, cautioning fans and media alike to not get too excited about the 2020-21 iteration of the Utes just yet. That’s just not his way. “It is one win, and it is a conference win and we’re thrilled. … But we will get right back in and keep grinding as we always do.”
Not to disobey the coach’s orders, but it’s going to be hard to not feel at least a bit optimistic for their prospects to move back into the top half of the league after the way the Utes (1-0) dismantled 0-3 Washington’s zone defense on one end of the court and then put the defensive clamps on the punchless Huskies on the other.
“It’s Game One in a marathon. It is one win, and it is a conference win and we’re thrilled. … But we will get right back in and keep grinding as we always do.” — Larry Krystkowiak, Utah men’s basketball head coach
After Utah’s start that Krystkowiak called “sluggish” and “a bit uneven,” the Huskies looked like the team getting its first taste of action, instead of its third. Then again, Baylor and UC Riverside routed UW, too, so obviously Utah still has a lot to prove.
“We have a good team this year,” said Plummer, the only senior on Utah’s roster. “We have a complete package.”
Or so it would seem.
Plummer matched UW’s Quade Green for game-high scoring honors with 21, but while the hot-shooting guard — who made a big splash at last year’s Pac-12 Tournament first-round game with 11 3-pointers — got some help, Green didn’t.
Allen chipped in 14 points, eight rebounds and four assists, Carlson had nine points, five rebounds and three blocks, and Mikael Jantunen added 10 points and eight boards in getting what seemed to be a surprise start over team captain Riley Battin.
Then there was the play of Larsson, the 6-foot-5 freshman from Nacka, Sweden, who showed he is ready to make the kind of instant impact Krystkowiak and others have been saying he would. He didn’t start, but he had six points and five assists in the first half alone before finishing with eight points and seven dimes.
Rest assured, Utah fans. Larsson is going to be a good one, a smooth operator-type with outstanding size and the ability to go inside. His defense was just OK, evidence by four fouls that took away some minutes. That will come as he gets used to how the game is officiated in the U.S.
“He does have a little moxie to him, and he’s got some size,” Krystkowiak said. “... And he’s a little bit of a calming influence.”
Allen, last year’s leading scorer and rebounder, said he welcomes the help. He won’t have to carry the scoring load as much this year, he surmised, with the emergence of Plummer far earlier this season than last, and much more bench help.
Larsson “is just a really polished guy, and a great teammate. … He’s a joy to have on the court,” Allen said.
Looking like a team with a couple of games under its belt, Washington jumped ahead 5-0 and forced Utah into four game-opening empty possessions before Plummer took a feed from Allen and got the Utes going.
It took a minute, but the Utes slowly figured out the zone that Rylan Jones said seems like four players across the free-throw line and one below them, and gradually pulled ahead. Sporting a strip beard that added a little more fierceness to his overall look, Jones didn’t score in the first half, despite playing 18 minutes, and finished with only six points.
But nobody was complaining — he directed the Utes as efficiently as in his first year, didn’t force shots, and collected five assists while slowly picking apart UW’s vaunted zone.
“Not an easy choice for a first opponent,” Krystkowiak said.
But as mentioned, the Utes didn’t fall on any excuses, barely mentioning postgame the COVID-19 spread that kept them from playing until this week — Utah’s latest season opener in the modern era (1975 to present) — and effected more than two-thirds of the team. They didn’t resume practicing until last week.
“Let’s just stay focused on things we can control,” Krystkowiak said, noting that the Pac-12 Tournament championship game is 14 weeks and two days away — 100 days, to be exact. To be playing in that game is a goal the Utes, picked to finish eighth in the league, have set for themselves. So far, so good. And just maybe, not playing in front of fans will help this team, after it struggled on the road in the Pac-12 last year.
“It is good that we got the first Pac-12 ‘W’ under our belts, but we have to take each game as the biggest game of the year,” Allen said.
The Utes trailed 15-9 and were listing a bit, but Larsson took a crisp pass from Jones and scored — his first of many baskets as a Ute — and Riley Battin followed with a 3-pointer to right the home team.
Carlson was credited with just three blocks, but he altered a half-dozen or more and was the presence down low that Utah needs him to be.
The Utes attacked the UW zone well enough to draw 12 first-half fouls but were just 10 of 15 from the stripe. The visitors didn’t get to the line until 1:02 remained in the first half, and Green collected the freebies for two of his game-leading 14 first-half points.
The Utes closed the first half with an 8-2 run to grab a 37-32 lead at the break, then maintained at least that advantage the rest of the way. They broke from a 51-46 lead with an 18-0 run, a spurt that enabled Krystkowiak to get 12 players into the game and show off his bench a little bit.
It is a bench that is considerably deeper than last year, the coach believes.
“I thought Washington ran out of gas a little bit,” Krystkowiak said, noting how the Huskies have been on the road for nearly a week, having made the trip up from Las Vegas where they played No. 2 Baylor on Sunday and UCR on Tuesday.