Utah coach Larry Krystkowiak was proud of his team’s poise and effort in 72-70 loss to Bruins, says it will be fine emotionally on Saturday against the Trojans at the Galen Center in Los Angeles
LOS ANGELES — Thursday’s disappointing 72-70 New Year’s Eve loss at UCLA brought more confidence than despair for the University of Utah basketball team, coach Larry Krystkowiak said after the Utes lost their 11th straight Pac-12 road game dating back to the 2018-19 season.
“It was one of those college basketball games that was a one-possession game and was there for the taking,” Krystkowiak said. “We just gotta keep building.”
The Utes (4-2, 1-1 Pac-12) remained in the Los Angeles area after the loss at Pauley Pavilion because they will take on USC (5-2, 0-1) across town at the Galen Center on Saturday at 2 p.m. MST. A few hours after the Utes fell to the Bruins when they failed to get off a shot in the final few seconds, the Trojans were upset 72-62 by Colorado.
So USC looks beatable, and the Utes now know they can hang with any team in the conference after pushing UCLA to the brink. Krystkowiak said in a Zoom meeting with reporters that he’s “not at all” worried about his team bouncing back from an emotional, heartbreaking loss.
“We are happy to be playing the game,” he said. “It is not time to have a pity party or play victim. … I thought we executed as many times as we didn’t down the stretch. I felt really good about our guys’ effort and poise. We can look at all the crazy little plays; At the end of the day I am proud of the guys.”
The coach revealed that sophomore point guard Rylan Jones “got drilled in the rib cage” in practice last Saturday and hadn’t practiced until the day before the UCLA game. Jones played well, but fouled out with 26 seconds left when he successfully stopped Jalen Hill from making a fast-break dunk and was not available to handle the ball on Utah’s last possession.
“We had a good week of practices, made some improvement, so I like, short of the fact that we didn’t win the basketball game, that our team is improving,” Krystkowiak said.
Team captain Timmy Allen, who scored 16 of his 18 points in the second half when Utah rallied from a nine-point halftime deficit to briefly take the lead around the six-minute mark, said the Utes showed they are not the same team that was 0-9 in Pac-12 road games last year.
“I think this is something we can for sure build on,” he said. “We had much more of a rough go last year. I think we for sure had our chances. We shot ourselves in the foot a little bit, did things that we usually don’t do, but we just happened to do it, and it just happened to be on the road, so I think if we just clean up a couple areas we will be more than OK.”
Allen needs 13 points against USC to become the 40th Utah player to score 1,000 points in his career, and 21st to do it as a junior. Alfonso Plummer leads the Utes in scoring with a 16.0 average after hitting for 22 against UCLA.
Utah hasn’t won a Pac-12 road game since thumping Washington State 92-79 on Feb. 23, 2019. It hasn’t won a true road game since beating Nevada 79-74 on Nov. 5, 2019. But the Utes aren’t dwelling on the futile streak, Krystkowiak said.
“We had our opportunities. We had a young team last year,” he said. “We are only as good as our next play. We don’t play the Jedi mind tricks too much with any kind of streaks or what has gone on in the past. … This isn’t the same group that hasn’t won a road game in a while. I’ve never been one to pay any attention to that.”
Of Utah’s nine conference road losses last year, only two were by single-digits — a 70-62 loss at Stanford in late February followed by an 86-79 overtime loss at California.
Krystkowiak was buoyed by Utah’s resilience Thursday, and how the Utes won the rebounding battle in the second half and matched UCLA’s physicality and defensive aggressiveness.
Trailing 72-70 after Hill missed a free throw with 3.9 seconds remaining, Utah had a chance to duplicate its buzzer-beating win over the Bruins at Pauley two years ago, but backup point guard Pelle Larsson threw the ball away as time was expiring, rather than attempt a shot.
“I know that is one everyone wants to talk about, the end of the game play, but we played a lot of good basketball in between and we have a lot that we can fix,” Krystkowiak said. “And that’s what I am interested in, is moving forward and building off this.”
Meanwhile, USC and Utah have one common opponent: BYU.
The Trojans routed the Cougars 79-53 on Dec. 1 in Uncasville, Connecticut, while the Cougars routed the Utes 82-64 in Provo on Dec. 12.
The Trojans are led in scoring by 7-footer Evan Mobley (16.7 ppg.) and redshirt senior Tahj Eaddy (12.0). A freshman, Mobley was the 2020 Morgan Wooten High School Player of the Year and the No. 1 recruit in the nation.
Eaddy is a 6-foot-2 guard who began his career at Southeast Missouri but really shined at Santa Clara of the West Coast Conference before moving on for a final season of eligibility at USC.
Eaddy had a team-high16 points and five assists in the Colorado loss, and had 16 points in the Trojans’ conquest of BYU a month ago.
Krystkowiak said USC is more inside-oriented than UCLA, so the challenge to get defensive rebounding rises even more.
USC has “guys who are going to be playing at the next level that we are facing, so it is a little bit of a different animal. But size and matching their physicality and being able to secure a defensive rebound, that is going to be first and foremost” for the Utes.
from Deseret News https://ift.tt/3n2kMh7
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