The Utah basketball team is guaranteed at least four more games this season.
That’s one of the few guarantees regarding the future right now, just days after Craig Smith was let go as the program’s head coach.
For the Runnin’ Utes players and personnel left to finish out the season, there is a focus on sticking together through the adversity.
“(Smith’s firing was unexpected, obviously, you know that timing, nobody really expected it,” Utah fifth-year guard Gabe Madsen said. “We just talked a lot about just channeling that energy that you feel, however you feel in the moment, just channel that and play for the guy who brought you here.
“That’s something we’ve just been trying to keep a little bit of the focal point, is you can feel sad, you can feel angry, however you’re feeling, but just channel it and use it for good in the games and come together.”
What’s left to play for
Utah came into its first year in the Big 12 picked to finish last in the league, yet with three games left in the regular season, the Utes (15-13, 7-10 Big 12) are in 10th place in the league standings and are one of eight teams within two games of each other in the middle.
It leaves Utah with the chance, however improbable or unlikely, of earning a top eight seed and a first-round bye in the Big 12 tournament, which runs March 11-15 at T-Mobile Center in Kansas City.
Interim coach Josh Eilert made sure to hammer that home with the team earlier this week.
“We’ve got a lot to play for. I told the guys yesterday, if you look at the standings, you know, there’s a logjam in the middle. The top eight teams in the Big 12 at the tournament are going to get a bye. We’ve got a lot to play for. We’ve got a lot to prove,” he said.
Two of Utah’s final three regular season games will be at home, where the Utes are 14-3 this season — including a four-game home winning streak dating back to the end of January.
“Obviously (we) have a ton to play for still. I mean, I want to play as many more games as I can with these guys,” Madsen said. “I love this group, and you know, it’s my final year, so I just want to go out and give it everything we’ve got these final games.
“Like Coach Eilert said, when you get a bye that’s a big advantage. We laid it all out there yesterday, drew it up on the whiteboard. Finish it out strong and set ourselves up for some success at the tournament.”
How the team reacted to the news of Craig Smith’s firing
Madsen said he was golfing when he got news of an emergency meeting Monday, the same day Utah athletic director Mark Harlan announced the school was making a “change in leadership” in the men’s basketball program.
“We were literally just out golfing, and we had practice at 3, and we had an emergency meeting called, and so it was the last thing I expected, and, I mean, I’ve just felt a lot of emotions this week,” Madsen said.
Madsen expressed gratitude towards Smith for giving him a chance at Utah, while wishing he had a chance to finish out the season with the head coach who brought him in four years ago as a transfer from Cincinnati.
“He was the first coach that really believed in me and gave me the opportunity to come here, and to not really have that final game together, or a little closure, (it’s) kind of sad,” Madsen said.
Eilert, who joined Smith’s staff last offseason after serving as interim head coach at West Virginia for the entire 2023-24 campaign, shared his appreciation for the professionalism he’s seen out of both players and staff members during these first few days of the transition.
“It’s been a whirlwind, you know, first and foremost,” said Eilert, whose first game as interim coach was an 83-66 loss at Arizona Wednesday.
“The situation we’ve been put in, they’ve done an absolute incredible job being professionals about it and understand their role in the situation, so I want to thank them and let them know it’s been an honor to be their leader through this turmoil, but excited to move forward with it and excited to finish the season the way it should be finished.”
Eilert said it’s “two totally different scenarios” between the interim coach situation he found himself in last year at West Virginia compared to being in the same spot now, for some obvious reasons.
At West Virginia, Eilert took over for Bob Huggins in the offseason and faced a roster build in the middle of the summer, and “that was a very hard situation to navigate from Day 1.”
At Utah, with the change happening in-season, the roster build wasn’t an issue, and Eilert credited the work Smith put forth in creating a program where guys are sticking together through the adversity.
“Not to say this isn’t a hard situation, but the foundation has been built here,” Eilert said. “The character of the guys and on the roster from top to bottom has been set, and all I’m really doing is keeping that thing going throughout the course.”
One of the underlying issues going forward, once a new coach and staff is in place, will be building the roster for the next generation of Utah basketball.
The Utes have several underclassmen, players such as Keanu Dawes, Ezra Ausar, Jake Wahlin and Miro Little, who will still have several years of basketball left to play.
Senior guard Hunter Erickson said the team has addressed the importance of handling the situation well.
“One thing we talked about is especially, maybe not with me and Gabe as much but with a lot of the other guys that have more years going for college basketball and whatnot, there a lot of other schools or whoever the coach might be coming in here are going to kind of look at that and see how guys handled this situation,” Erickson said.
“And I think it’s just in our best interest to handle, or channel kind of like Gabe said, all the emotions that we’re gonna have and just keep playing hard and be professional about it.”
Fighting for each other
The rest of the regular season includes home games against Arizona State Saturday (5 p.m. MST, ESPN+) and West Virginia next Tuesday (7 p.m. MST, ESPN+) in the home finale, before a matchup at BYU on March 8.
Then it’s off to Kansas City for the conference tournament.
Just two weeks ago, Utah won back-to-back home games against Kansas and Kansas State. Those, along with their home win over BYU earlier in the season, were two of the team’s top three victories this year.
While inconsistency became a hallmark of the struggles during the Smith era — he went 65-62 as the Utes’ head coach and was 15-43 in road/neutral games — it’s fair to also say that this year’s team has exceeded expectations in some ways, including the prediction they would finish last in the Big 12.
The focus, in the short term, is to finish strong and savor these final moments at the Huntsman.
“The fact that it’s like the final two games at the Huntsman, it’s kind of crazy after four years being here, and if you told me all this leading up to is going to be how it ended for these final two games, I’d tell you you were kind of crazy,” Madsen said.
“I keep telling the guys this, we’ve only got four guaranteed games together. I keep saying it’s one of my favorite groups I’ve been a part of. (It’s about) going out there and not taking any of it for granted, not wishing any of it away, and just going out there, playing for each other and enjoying the last final games at the Huntsman.”
Erickson echoed those sentiments while emphasizing the importance of rising to the occasion when a challenge presents itself.
“Life’s just about how you respond to challenges. Everyone’s gonna have challenges and adversities and things come up, and it’s just how you respond to them,” he said.
“Going into these games, we’ve just got to give it everything we’ve got. We’ve had our whole lives basically to build up this moment. I’ve played basketball my entire life coming up to this last stretch here, and just gotta fight through whatever happens and just give it our all.”
