For all seven Division I men’s basketball programs in the state of Utah, last week’s action brought about something rather significant, especially considering we’re still just in the middle of January and have a pretty long ways to go in the regular season.
Some of it was positive, as a few teams had multiple victories, and some of it was negative, as losses piled up and for a program or two. Here’s a rundown of all the action:
Utah State
At this point, there’s little question that the Utah State Aggies are playing the best of any team in the state. Heading into last week, the Aggies had won eight games in a row, although there was some question about just how good Craig Smith’s team was because all of those victories were against pretty bad teams.
Well, Utah State finally got some challenges last week with two games against the San Diego State Aztecs, and the Aggies won both of them, making a statement that at the very least, they’re real contenders for the Mountain West Conference crown.
In the first game last Thursday, Utah State was in control much of the way en route to a 12-point victory, and then on Saturday, the Aggies proved they can win in the clutch, as they did just enough down the stretch to win by five. Sure, the Aztecs were without their best player in the second game, Matt Mitchell, but beating a good team twice in three days is hard to do.
Utah State is largely succeeding with its defense, as it ranks seventh in the entire country in points allowed, giving up just 59.3 per game (San Diego State scored just 45 and 59 points, respectively, in the two contests last week).
Individually, junior big fella Neemias Queta has been ridiculous, as he leads the Aggies in points, rebounds, blocks, assists and steals per game. Scoring for the team is coming in balanced fashion, as Queta is averaging just 12.2 points, but Marco Anthony is at 11.5, Justin Bean is at 10.5 and five others are at more than 5 per game.
Utah State has two games on the road this week against a Colorado State Rams team that is also off to a very good start.
BYU
In truth, it’s probably most fair to say that the jury is still out on nearly every team in the country at this point, but that’s especially the case for the Cougars. The good news for them is that after a rather up-and-down start, they came away with two big victories last week on the road.
First, BYU exorcised its demons at Saint Mary’s, a place it hadn’t won at since 2014, and then the Cougars beat a San Francisco team that appears could be solid this season (it was the first time since 2018 that BYU had won there). In both games, the Cougars started slow before turning things on in the second half.
BYU returns home for two games this week, getting back to the Marriott Center for the first time in a month. Can the Cougars prove to be the second-best team in the West Coast Conference behind the top-ranked Gonzaga Bulldogs?
Utah
It’s appearing more and more likely that the Runnin’ Utes are who we thought they were. That is, not very good. After a 1-4 start in Pac-12 play, Utah got a nice win last week against the Stanford Cardinal, but then it lost to the lowly Cal Golden Bears on Saturday.
The script has generally been the same in every game. The Utes will actually start very well before squandering big leads in the second half. At this point, frustration with head coach Larry Krystkowiak is growing louder among fans with each loss.
It’s certainly still possible Utah can right the ship to some degree and have a decent season, but it’s also fair to wonder how bad things could potentially get.
Southern Utah
Like Utah State, the SUU T-Birds had a chance to prove last week that a big win streak it had going wasn’t mostly just a product of playing lesser teams, as it had two contests against Eastern Washington, the squad picked to win the Big Sky Conference.
Looking at the glass half empty, SUU’s nine-game win streak was snapped last Thursday. Looking at the glass half full, the T-Birds bounced back and beat Eastern Washington on the road on Saturday.
It’s darn near impossible to win every game, so now the question becomes how good is SUU really? Todd Simon’s team is tied for 16th in the country in points per game at 83.9 but was held to a season-low 63 in its loss before scoring a season-high 99 on Saturday (the T-Birds have scored at least 90 points four times this season, which is fun!).
It might be most fair at this point to say “wait and see” before declaring SUU more than a good team, although it’s probably safe to give the T-Birds that much. They’ve got two games against in-state Big Sky rival Weber State on the road this week.
Weber State
Speaking of the Wildcats, they got on the court for the first time since Jan. 2 last week (their games against Eastern Washington the week before were called off because of COVID-19 issues at EWU) and came away with two wins against nonconference foes Yellowstone Christian College and Tarleton State.
The jury is definitely still out on Weber State, but head coach Randy Rahe and company should be able to find their level over the next few weeks as they settle into Big Sky play, starting with the big series against SUU.
UVU
The Wolverines found themselves at 3-0 in WAC play after a thrilling 93-92 win over Seattle on Friday, but then the rubber match on Saturday was canceled because of COVID-19 issues within the Seattle program (there is no indication yet that it will cause problems within UVU’s program).
UVU is getting the job done in a variety of ways as far as final scores are concerned, but there have been two constants in the three WAC wins: The Wolverines can put the ball in the bucket (they’ve averaged 83.7 points per game in the three contests), and Fardaws Aimaq continues to be the best rebounder in the entire country, as he’s averaging 15.1 per game (14.7 over the last three).
UVU isn’t scheduled to play again until Jan. 29 and 30 when Tarleton State is slated to go to Orem.
Dixie State
Ending on a low note wasn’t the intention here, but the Trailblazers lost all three of their games last week in their first action since facing Gonzaga on Dec. 29, including two on the against UT Rio Grande Valley to open WAC play (the other was against the Mountain West’s New Mexico Lobos).
Dixie State is scheduled to return home this week for two games, but they’ll surely be a challenge against Grand Canyon.