In a little over two weeks, Alex Jensen and his Utah basketball team will get their first taste of Big 12 play when the Runnin’ Utes host No. 1 Arizona on Jan. 3.
Between now and then, the Utes will wrap up nonconference action with a home game against Eastern Washington on Saturday (5 p.m. MST, ESPN+) before a road matchup at Washington on Dec. 29 (9 p.m. MST, FS1).
Jensen is hoping to see the team show more consistency in the final lead-up to conference play. Consistency, or a lack thereof, is something that’s plagued Utah (7-4) at times through its first 11 games, and it’s a reminder that the rebuild of the Utes program is more on a long-term trajectory.
Jensen said he’s seen his team make some headway in learning from its previous miscues, but last weekend’s 82-74 loss against Mississippi State at the Delta Center — when Utah blew a 17-point lead — showed there’s still plenty of work to be done.
“(We need to) just continue to get better and make improvements and try to limit making the same mistake over and over again,” the coach said. “The last game, I thought we put together a good 20-25 minutes against Mississippi State, and then we kind of imploded.
“Not to take anything away from Mississippi State, but we kind of beat ourselves, so like, (I want to see) less and less of that, because it’s only going to get harder once the Big 12 schedule starts.”
In limited chances, the Utes have shown they are capable of competing in stretches against other power conference teams.
So far, Utah has beaten Ole Miss 75-74 at the Acrisure Series and lost to Cal 79-72 in the team’s first true road game of the season, in addition to the aforementioned Mississippi State setback.
That’s a 1-2 record against two SEC and one ACC opponent, and in each, the Utes have had their chances to win.
- Against Ole Miss, the Utes built a 14-point first-half lead before beating the Rebels in a back-and-forth final few minutes on two Terrence Brown free throws.
- A week later, Utah held an early eight-point lead against Cal but the Golden Bears rallied. Utah went cold offensively at the end with a chance to take the lead before falling by seven.
- In the most recent example of the topsy turvy season for a Utah team with so many new faces, what looked like it might be one of Utah’s most complete performances of the season only lasted a half against Mississippi State. Utah led by as many as 17 points in the opening 20 minutes and went into halftime up 10, but the Bulldogs used a 15-0 run in the second half to take control and hand Utah a frustrating loss.
In the Big 12, the competition will take another step up in difficulty, and better consistency and effort will be required to win for a Utah team that was projected to finish 13th in the league.
On Friday, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi updated his power conference rankings, and the Big 12 came in at No. 1, jumping past the Big Ten and SEC to claim the throne heading into the new year.
“Prior to the SEC’s record-setting storm a season ago, the Big 12 was the No. 1 conference on KenPom for three straight seasons and nine of the past 11. It is on track to regain the top spot in 2026,” he wrote.
Once Utah hits league play, it’ll be facing Quad 1 or Quad 2 opponents every night. As of now, the Utes have gone 0-1 against Quad 1 opponents, 1-0 vs. Quad 2, 2-2 vs. Quad 3 and 4-1 vs. Quad 4.
Their next chance to become more consistent arrives Saturday in what is viewed by the analytics as Utah’s most winnable game the rest of the year.
Eastern Washington (2-9) is currently No. 280 in the NET rankings, while Utah comes in at No. 151, which is 36 spots lower than the next-lowest Big 12 team, Cincinnati.
KenPom, Haslametrics and Bart Torvik all favor the Utes in this weekend’s game, projecting a double-digit win. It’s also the last projected win for Utah this year from those three metrics. Unless things change, the Utes are likely to be the underdogs in the remainder of their games.
First things first — facing an Eastern Washington team that is struggling to string together wins but could benefit from watching tape of Utah’s game against Mississippi State.
“They’re gonna post up more than we’ve seen this year. They’re going to do a variety of defenses, and it’s actually kind of a good thing. ... I imagine Eastern Washington will have watched the Mississippi State game and watch them press and go to a zone and see us struggle with it, so expect to see that,” Jensen said.
“And you know, the other thing is, they’re old — I think most of them are seniors, which is a big difference, so they’ve played before.”
Washington (7-3), like much of the competition Utah will face in the Big 12, is currently a Quad 1 matchup. Earlier this month, the Huskies went on the road and beat then-No. 24 USC for their first Big Ten win.
Jensen praised his team for its resiliency as it worked this week to bounce back from its latest setback. The results of that work will translate — for good or bad — when Utah hosts Eastern Washington.
“It’s kind of good and bad that you have a week between games. It’s kind of nice just to get back on the court and do it,” Jensen said of how Utah has responded to last week’s loss.
“But you know, I think they’ve responded well all year, and I guess the real test is how they come out Saturday night.”