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Show www.dailyutahchronicle.com SPORTS Wednesday Saturday Men's Basketball Women's Basketball Men's Basketball 7 P.M. Huntsman Center 7 P.M. Huntsman Center Michigan @ Utah 7 Westminster @ Utah Oklahoma @ Utah 2 P.M. Huntsman Center Monday, December 7, 2009 Saturday (Dec. 19) Women's Basketball Score Men's Basketball 4ta 60 Illinois State @ Utah 4 P.M. Huntsman Center 55 FOOTBALL Utes will head to Poinsettia Bowl Bryan Chouinard ASST. SPORTS EDITOR For the second time in three years, the Utes will wrap up their season with a trip to San Diego. Sunday afternoon, it was announced that the Utes accepted a bid to play in the Poinsettia Bowl against the Golden Bears of California. After closing out the season with an overtime loss to BYU in Provo, the Utes finished the season ranked No. 23 in the Bowl Championship Series and will look to stretch the nation's longest active bowl winning streak to nine games. "We are looking forward to playing in the Poinsettia Bowl for the second time in three years," said head coach Kyle Whittingham. "We had a great experience there in 2007, and our players and staff are excited to be going back." This year, Utah completed its third straight season with nine wins or more and went undefeated at home for the second straight season. But the Utes struggled to find any consistency on the road in 2009, falling short in big-time road tests against Oregon, TCU and BYU. "(The BYU game) left a bad taste in our mouth," said Utah captain Zane Beadles. "It wasn't the way we wanted to finish the season, but we got one more chance to go out and play together and we'll make the most of it." Cal, which started the season ranked in the Top to, got off to a quick start in 2009 before running into the Oregon Ducks at Autzen Stadium. When the Utes went into Autzen, the Ducks came out on top, 31-24. The following week, the Ducks hosted Cal, and blew out the thenNo. 6 ranked team in the nation, 423. The Ducks' defense smothered the Cal offense, which is led by former 1• Alabama 2• Texas 3• Cincinnati 4• TCU 5• Florida 6• Boise St. 7• Oregon 8• Ohio St. 9• Georgia Tech 10• Iowa 11• Virginia Tech 12• LSU 13• Penn St. 14• BYU THIEN SOK/The Daily Utah Chronicle Quarterback Jordan Wynn looks to make it past a BYU player looking to tackle him during the Utah-BYU game. See FOOTBALL Page 9 15• Miami (FL) 16• West Virginia 17• Pittsburgh 18• Oregon St. 19• Oklahoma St. 20• Arizona 21. Stanford 22• Nebraska 23• Utah 24• USC 25• Wisconsin MEN'S BAKETBALL Underclassmen key in win No upset Early lead fades in 2nd half, but Utah holds on against Idaho State Runnin' Utes reverse last year's Bengal outcome Joseph Simmons STAFF WRITER Young players stole the show in the Utes' win over Idaho State that put the men's basketball team back at .5oo. Jay Watkins scored 15 points, and David Foster recorded his first career double-double as the Runnin' Utes put together a convincing 68-56 victory over the Idaho State Bengals on Saturday night. The Utes jumped on the Bengals early with tough defense and built up a 17-point lead at 25-8 with just more than eight minutes left in the first half. "I thought defensively we set the tone to start the game," said head coach Jim Boylen. "The way we played defense the first to minutes was as good as it's been." The Bengals struggled to get any inside shots, thanks in large part to Foster's presence in the paint. Having to rely mostly on their perimeter game, the Bengals shot just 25 percent from the field in the first half and went 0-5 from 3-point range. Going into halftime, Utah was firing on all cylinders and had built up a comfortable 25-point lead at 40-15. Although the Utes were able to defend their lead, the second half saw a drop in defensive intensity for the Utes. Even with the convincing victory, Boylen said there's still room to improve. "I thought we got a little selfish on the offensive end and then in the defensive end," Boylen said. "Young teams do that, and I don't like it. We have to work on that, playing the 4o full minutes." The final difference of the game, 12 points, was as close as the Bengals got in the second half, but it did represent the Utes getting outscored 41-28. Idaho State center Demetrius Monroe, who had a double-double of his own with 19 points and it rebounds, dropped 17 points on the Utes in the second half. As a team, the Bengals jumped to shooting almost 55 percent in the second, but the Utes fell to about 31 percent combined. "I'll give them credit, they made a few more See BASKETBALL Page 8 Bubba Brown 0 STAFF WRITER THIEN SOK/The Daily Utah Chronicle David Foster goes for a layup past Idaho State defenders during Saturday's game. Foster had a double-double with 10 rebounds and 12 points. WOMEN'S BASKETBALL Starters' efforts not enough as Utah falls to Louisville Paige Fieldsted SPORTS EDITOR After an overtime win against Idaho State, the Utah women's basketball team couldn't get it done against Louisville, and fell to last year's runner-up 60-55. Despite having four scorers in double-digits, the Utes' turnovers and an unproductive bench plagued the young team as it dropped to 4-4. All of Utah's points came from its starters, led by Kalee Whipple with 16 points. Taryn Wicijowski put in 15, and Janita Badon and Halie Sawyer had 12 and to, respectively. In contrast, Louisville's bench contributed 22 points to its winning effort. this time After last week's overtime win against Idaho State, head coach Elaine Elliott said the team was working on getting bench players playing time so they could step in and play in any situation but that they weren't quite there—something that played a big part in the close loss to Louisville. The Utah starters played the majority of the minutes as Whipple, Wicijowski, Sawyer and Badon all played 37 minutes or more. Rachel Messer saw the most time coming off the bench, as she played nine minutes. Utah led by six with to minutes left to go in the second half, but a 13-1 run by the Cardinals was out of reach for the Utes, as they didn't get closer than three the rest of the game. The Utes shot 4o percent from the field compared to Louisville's 39.2 percent. The Cardinals won the rebounding and turnover battle, as they edged the Utes 36 32 in rebounds and 19-16 in turnovers. Badon led the Utes' rebounding effort with eight, and Wicijowski pulled down seven. Despite having similar statistics and being able to keep the game close, experience was once again the reason the Utes came up short. "Our kids competed exceptionally hard," Elliott said. "We could have pulled out the 'W' We are so far from executing and understanding the things that we need - to understand, and we were right there. I am proud of them." Louisville was led by Becky Burke, who led all scorers with 20 points. Monique Reid added it and eight other players scored for the Cardinals. After playing five games in nine days, the Utes will get a big break heading into Finals Week, as they don't play again until Saturday when they host Westminster. The game will begin a five-game home stand for the Utes. They will wrap up their preseason schedule with games against South Dakota State, Oregon, Southern Methodist University and Utah Valley University. pfieldsted@ chronicle.utah.edu A year ago, Idaho State, which was 1-5 at the time, shocked the Runnin' Utes in one of the most surprising losses in recent memory. With the Utes' convincing 12-point win against the Bengals on Saturday night, one might think that Utah was snatching a slice of payback. However, head coach Jim Boylen said revenge was far from his mind coming into the game. "I don't coach like that, no," Boylen said. "We're a totally different team than we had last year. If you want to get into retribution in this business, I think it's a dead end. You've got to make your guys better, you've got to grow with your team, and every year is different." Last season's loss was the first time Utah had lost to Idaho State in more than 5o years. The Utes got down big early in that game, but battled back to take a second-half lead before eventually losing 72-68, despite 22 points from Luke Nevill. Adding to the disappointment of that loss, the Utes were 5-1 and entered the contest having won five straight. The loss was perhaps the low point of a disturbing trend of Utah basketball in recent seasons of surprising losses to teams from smaller conferences. During the past two years, the Utes have lost to Southwest Baptist, Seattle University and Weber State in addition to Idaho State. The Utes appeared to be determined to not let that happen again when they jumped out to a 25-point lead in the first half of Saturday's game. Senior guard Luka Drca said one key difference between this season's matchup and last season's was the Utes' ability to get out to the big lead this time, rather than letting the Bengals stick around. "It was a bad loss," Drca said of last season's defeat. "(Tonight) we came out ready to play. Our defense was really good, and when our defense is good, our offense comes around." The win continues a positive streak for the Utes to help balance out the negative trend of losing to lower opponents. The Utes have not lost nonconference games to any team in consecutive years in the Boylen era. Last season, Utah avenged 2007-2008 losses with wins against Oregon and Gonzaga. So far this season, the Utes have already atoned for last season's loss to Utah State. The Utes will have one more chance to extend the streak this season, when they face Oklahoma, which beat them 70-52 last season. Although revenge might not be the Utes' mindsets, a double-digit win such as the one the Utes delivered Idaho State would go a long way toward erasing any memory of last season's drubbing in Oklahoma. b.brown@ chronicle.utah.edu |
