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Show 'Just like football #0 co/J at Huntsman Center, suffer worst loss to Utes since 1999 Touc/zBase Schedules Men's Basketball Tjj SATURDAY DEC. 8 USU @ CS Bakersfield, 8 p.m. SATURDAY DEC. 15 USU vs. Prairie View A&M, 8 p.m. THURSDAY DEC. 20 glimpses where it looked like we might get in the game, but they were short lived." assistant sports editor The Aggie offense was just as anemic at the end of the game, as they only scored The only good showing from Utah State four points on two Brayden Bell jumpers Wednesday night at the Huntsman Center ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ in the last eight minutes. was in the stands. Overall, USU shot 37 perA rowdy sea of Aggie cent from thefieldon 17blue took over three secof-46 shooting. Mistakes tions of the upper bowl, on the offensive end, UTAH 72 making noise for most of including 13 turnovers and the game. a few ill-advised 3-point The same couldn't be shots killed some of the said for the men in blue on the court. Aggie runs, as they only recorded two Utah State was handed a 24-point beatpoints off 10 Ute turnovers. ing—72-48—by the University of Utah, breaking the first two-game winning [1 See BLOWOUT, page 10 streak of the year and pushing the Aggies back to .500 at 5-5. "We've come down here and played well and we've come down here and got hammered, and that's what happened tonight," USU head coach Stew Morrill said. "They just beat us in every phase of the game ... We couldn't guard them. We couldn't score. We got out-rebounded. They're a lot better basketball team than we are right now. It's not even close." From the start, it never looked good for the Aggies. The Utes came out on fire, scoring the first 11 points of the game on four makes—three 3-pointers and a dunk—and they never looked back. Utah pushed that run to 194 before the Utah State offense woke up and went on a 7-3 mini run in the middle of the first half. Except for a few little runs during the game,,the Aggie offense was almost nonexistent. It took until the 9:45 mark in the first half for Utah State to reach double digits on a three from junior guard Desmond Stephens. USU COACH STEW MORRILL chas"We were behind the eight ball all tises his team late in the second half in the night," Morrill said. "We showed a couple By DAVID BAKER GameOvBr USU 48 U T A H CENTER LUKE NEVILL snags a rebound away from Utah State forward Tai Wesley Wednesday night. Nevill scored 20 points and had 14 rebounds in the Ute route. Wesley had nine points, three rebounds and USU's only blocked shot. TYLER LARSON photo Huntsman Center. TYLER LARSON photo A letter of rage and discontent BySAMBRYNER sen/or writer Carrol versus the Utes Playing in his fourth game against the University of Utah, Aggie senior guard Jaycee Carroll went into Wednesday night's contest averaging 21 points per game on 58 percent shooting. Last year at the Spectrum, Carroll scored 27 points, including five 3-pointers. Wednesday night Carroll tied a season low with 11 points on 4-of-7 shooting including, l-of-3 from beyond the 3-point line. When asked if Utah used a different strategy defensively this year against him, Carroll said they did not. "1 saw the same stuff last year, saw the same stuff this year," Carroll said. Head coach Stew Morrill blamed Carroll's lack of touches on the teams poor screens. "They did a good job on Jaycee," Morrill said of the Ute defense. "We ran the whole play book at them, but we didn't screen. It's tough to get him a look when you don't screen." Two point guard system Utah State saw success against Santa Clara when playing senior point guard Kris Clark and junior point guard Desmond Stephens at the same time. Against the University of Utah, the two-guard system didn't produce the same kind of results. Combined, the guards recorded seven assists and six turnovers. Shots were not falling either as the duo combined to shoot 3-of-13 from the field. All three of the shots they made were 3pointers. "Offensively we didn't play our game," Carroll said. Battle for the Old Oquirrh Bucket Established prior to the 1974-75 season, the Old Oquirrh Bucket is the symbol of in-state basketball supremacy in Utah. Over the last six years Utah State has won the Old Oquirrh Bucket twice, while the University of Utah has won it three times. Overall Utah State has won the Bucket seven times. With the loss to Utah, the Aggies are now 1-2 on the season against in-state teams. The Aggies have lost to the Utes and the Weber State Wildcats, while picking up a win at home against the Southern Utah Thunderbirds. Utah has a 2-0 record in-state. Weber State is 1-2, while Brigham Young has a record of 1-0 versus in-state competition. Utah State has one in-state game left when they take on Utah Valley at home Dec. 20 during the Gossner Foods Holiday Classic. Carroll record watch When Carroll made his first and only 3-pointer of the game with 7:11 left in the second half, he extended his consecutive games with a made 3-point shot to 31. For his career he has made at least one 3-pointer in 97 out of 108 games. Wednesday night's trey moved Carroll into sole possession of made 3-pointers for a Utah State player. He passed former Aggie star Tony Brown, who played from 1999-2002. Carroll now has 284. Carroll needs to score 71 more points to move ahead of Wayne Estes for second place in all-time scoring at USU. Carroll currently has 1,931 points for his career while Estes scored 2,001 points. The all-time points leader is Greg Grant, who scored 2,127 points. If Carroll continues on his scoring average of 19.4 points per game, he would pass up Estes on Dec. 21 at home during the Gossner Foods Classic, and he would break the all time record at Louisiana Tech on Jan. 24. Garbage Time In what Morrill considers 20/20 time—when a team is up by 20 or down by 20—many Aggies saw playing time Wednesday who haven't been off the bench for very long this season. [1 See NOTEBOOK, page 10 ear men's basketball team: Where where you Wednesday night? Salt Lake City. Huntsman Center. 8 p.m. start. Does that ring a bell? Three sections of fans from Logan showed up. But, you? Where were you guys? You might think you were there, but I didn't see much of anything. From my grade school years 1 remember being taught how winter is a time for bears to hibernate. Normal humans, however, don't hibernate—especially you, the college basketball players, who usually come alive in winter. What I witnessed from the comforts of my parents' television was 100 percent pathetic, heartrending, miserable, pitiful, poor, rueful, sorry and wretched. Any of those can describe a 17-of-46 field goal shooting performance. Any of those can paint the picture of a 30 percent firsthalf snooting performance. Any of those can fit a team that made 23 percent of its 3-pointers—a good number of them wide open. But, most important of all, any of those tell you how I felt about being crushed—CRUSHED!— by a team I simply despise losing to—the University of Utah. I know Stew Morritl has already done his share of chewing you out, but I cannot refrain. mere's a certain man on your team who is an AllAmerican candidate. Do you remember him? His name is Jaycee Carroll. If he continues scoring 20 points each game, he will be Utah State's all-time leading scorer. Yet, most of the night the ball was on the opposite side that he was on. What was that all about? Sure, the University of Utah's Lawrence Borha is a good defender, but he certainly isn't that good. You guys did an excellent job at making him look good. Come on. Carroll ends with 11 points and only one 3-pointer? Ridiculous. Last year in the Spectrum Carroll was able to drop 27 points on nearly the same Ute squad except for the ever-energetic Jim Boylen. The Utes drain 9-of-18 mostly wide-open shots from 3-point range? Two words: help defense. Brayden Bell, it was good to see you get into the game in the final eight minutes. However, it isn't custom for a 6foot-9-fnch center like yourself to put up a 3-pointer from NBA range as the first thing you do when you get into the game. Gary Wilkinson, you did the same thing, but in the first half. I know you made one against Santa Clara last Saturday, but let's leave the 3-pointers to the smaller guards who are usually more consistent at converting D •I See TEAM, page 12 USU vs. Utah Valley State, 8 p.m. FRIDAY DEC. 21 USU vs. Furman/No. Arizona, 8 p.m. SATURDAY DEC. 29 USU vs. Oral Roberts, 7 p.m. THURSDAY JAN. 3 USU vs. Hawaii, 7 p.m. SATURDAY JAN. 5 USU @ Nevada, 8 p.m. Women's Basketball •• SATURDAY DEC. 8 USU @ No. Arizona, 3 p.m. SATURDAY DEC. 15 USU @ Utah, 3 p.m. MONDAY DEC. 17 USU vs. Montana St., 7 p.m. SATURDAY DEC. 22 USU vs. St. Mary's, 1 p.m. SATURDAY DEC. 29 USU vs. BYU, 5 p.m. WEDNESDAY JAN. 2 USU @ Southern Utah, 7 p.m. SATURDAY JAN. 5 USU vs. San Jose State, 7 p.m. fr"T1 Hockey "l^:-^>7] FRIDAY DEC. 7 USU vs. Utah Valley State, 8 p.m. FRIDAY DEC. 14 USU @ BYU, 8 p.m. SATURDAY DEC; 15 " •'"'' USU vs. Utah, 8 p.m. Nielson named to AVCA West Region 1st team BY USU ATHLETICS * Utah State volleyball player Amanda Nielson was named to the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) West Region first-team it was announced on Wednesday. With her selection, Nielson is now eligible for Ail-American consideration, which will be announced on Dec. 12. Nielson was one of just three players from the Western Athletic Conference to earn . first-team AVCA West Region honors and one of three players from the state of Utah to be recognized. Utah State has now had four players earn AVCA all-region honors in the lastfiveyears as Erin Cartwright-Davis and Zuzana Cernianska earned first-team honors in 2003 and 2005, respectively, while Erin Graybill earned honorable mention all-region honors in 2005. Aggie softball releases 2008 schedule / BY USU ATHLETJCS Utah State softball head coach Candi Letts announced on Thursday the Aggies' 2008 schedule, as the Aggies will play a total of 51 games, including 19 home contests at the LaRee and LeGrand Johnson Field. USU will play its first 23 games of the season on the road before hosting Utah on March 26 in its home opener. "The schedule is very chal* lenging but I think it will make us step up and become a better program," Letts said. |