Best performance of the year

[NashvilleUteFan]

There is still 14 min left in this game and I can already confidently say this is our best performance of the year and it’s not close. We have not fared well on the road in conference play for several years now and tonight we look comfortable. Playing at our pace, getting into our sets on offense, and playing solid defense. Just quality basketball. What a welcome sight.

[The Miami Ute]

Thumbs up but I hope that you didn’t jinx us. I will admit that I’m very pleasantly surprised to see Utah in control in an arena that BYU lost in last Saturday night. Maybe once Utah gets its second wind in the conference their decided length advantage over the vast majority of teams will pay some dividends.

[The Miami Ute]

Oh my Lord!!! Why hasn’t Dawes been playing regularly? Seems like a tough ask to guard him.

[NashvilleUteFan]

Been asking myself the same thing. Seems every year since Craig was the coach we have a guy who breaks out a few games into conference play who hadn’t been getting many minutes up to that point. Deivon last year (although I think some of that time he was waiting on eligibility), Mike Saunders the year before, and David Jenkins the year before. Figure it out Craig!

[Utopia]

Saunders and Jenkins may have had a couple of good games, but otherwise they were consistently pretty bad. I especially remember Saunders getting plenty of opportunities and getting pulled because he was immmediately awful. His A:TO ratio and shooting percentages were dreadful. Neither of those two were P5 players and nowhere near as productive as Deivon and Dawes.

[The Miami Ute]

I can only imagine where this team would be if Smith hadn’t transferred to Saint John’s. Certainly better than 10-6 at this point of the season. Smith, by the way, is having a good season with the Johnnies (15-3 this season so far), averaging almost 11 PPG/6 RBG/4 APG on 28 Minutes a night.

[Utefanbybirthandchoice]

The team was better with Rolly than Smith. Smith was a me first player that dribbled himself into trouble and was able to bail himself out with phenomenal athleticism. He was benched by Pitino early in the season for his me first attitude.

[The Miami Ute]

I don’t know about that. I don’t recall the team really accomplishing anything when Worster was getting major minutes. On the other hand, you could make a solid case that Smith was the only reason why last season’s team made it to the NIT Semis. Do you know why Worster transferred to Nebraska?

[Utopia]

Deivon is starting and a key player on a good team for a coach who has won two national championships. He is playing more and is more productive than Rollie on a worse team. That should tell you who the better player is. Rollie is a decent game manager; Deivon is a difference maker.

The reason it may have seemed like Deivon was selfish at Utah is because Craig Smith realized riding Deivon’s individual talent gave Utah its best chance at winning (i.e. lack of other talent) and so Deivon was given the green light…which was the right choice because Deivon single-handedly won and kept us in several games. If Deivon was just being selfish, don’t you think Smith would have benched him? In addition to his scoring, Deivon averaged 7 AST with an almost 4:1 AST/TO ratio, which is ELITE efficiency. Any coach would take that all day every day, as proven by his current role.

[The Miami Ute]

To me, the most shocking thing about D. Smith is that, despite missing a portion of the season (seven games), he set the PAC record for triple-doubles in a season. When you think of all the Hall of Famers that have played in that conference, it’s just crazy to know that no other player had more triple-doubles than Smith. And, no one will ever be able to take that record away from him.

[Utopia]

Yep, Deivon is basically a poor-man’s Derrick Rose. Deivon is a little smaller, not quite as slick handles, and just less refined overall, but basically the same main attributes that make Rose special.

[Utopia]

Keanu Dawes highlights vs TCU

That is an impressive highlight reel.

I commented early in the season he looked like he had major potential and could end up being our best big by the end of the year…and then he was inexplicably benched for six games. Not only is he an athletic scorer, he’s a good passer. He’s made a number of really nice touch passes to other bigs for easy dunks in the last few games. Why in the world was Keller playing ahead of him for so long? Keller hasn’t shown anything and shouldn’t be getting any regular minutes at this point.

[//r00t4Utes]

Well, Keller plays backup 5, where Keanu plays backup 4.

Now you could ask why Lohner was getting so many minutes over Keanu.

Any fan can and does question a coaches substitutions, and I’m definitely one of those, and Smith’s has been frustrating since year 1.

I thought he has always played favorites and overplayed their minutes to talent ratio. Now Rollie Worster and Anthony had more talent than Erickson and Lohner, but those are the easiest examples to me.

But I’m very surprised and very happy with the win, hoping this is a momentum building win.

[Utopia]

That might be the official positional rotation, but Keller and Dawes are about the same size and in college you can usually get away with playing 6’9″ at center. Also, you don’t always need a true center. Dawes certainly is no less physically capable than Keller. Play the guys that make a difference. Keller just isn’t impactful at all (doesn’t even rebound). Lohner was decently productive in his first six games before Dawes’ re-emergence in the last few games. I’d rather see Lohner get more minutes at the expense of Keller with combinations of Lovering, Wahlin, Dawes, Lohner covering the 4 & 5 (Wahlin can also play some 3). Relegate Keller to getting minimal spot duty when really needed. He should not be regularly playing 10+ minutes.

Anyway, I’m glad Smith seems to have found a lineup/rotation that is clicking and hope it continues. Good timing with TDS next.

[//r00t4Utes]

I was also thinking, when Lovering had to sit or is in foul trouble, if we’ll ever see the lineup of
Mike
Gabe
Jake
Ausar
Keanu

No true big but all 6’6″ to 6’10” that are skilled enough to pass, shoot, or score and dribble. Could change Ausar with Lohner, but I don’t trust him on offense other than to hustle, pass, or dunk.

[The Miami Ute]

Well, I’m feeling a hell of a lot better going into Saturday’s game versus the TDS. If Utah easily handled a TCU team that beat BYU, and who hadn’t lost at home until tonight, we might have a shot on Saturday.

[Tony (admin)]

Utes win. Utes win.

[The Miami Ute]

Hip Hip Hooray!!!

[Kellso]

Good win! Go Utes!

[GameForAnyFuss]

I love this bigger lineup. The length makes up for some of our subpar athleticism. It seems to be causing opponents some problems around the rim on both ends of the court.

Tonight I’m especially encouraged that we can have an off shooting night and still get a wire-to-wire road win.

[SteelUte]

Good win! Keep playing tough boys!

[D T]

Excellent showing tonight….Defeat the zoobs on Saturday & we’re at .500 in conference play after that rough start.

[utefansince79]

The players looked like they were having fun and enjoying things.

Hope a lot of Utah fans (in particular the students) come out and cheer loudly Saturday.

[Charlie]

Part of settling down the rotation is consistency and that extends to what the other team is prepared for. Sometimes developments disappear when the next team prepares for a specific thing better. Either way, we seem to be settling into more options and better options. Figuring that out with matchups that change game to game is difficult. We tend to remember offense more but small things on defense also matter in rotations. Bottom line, get the arrow pointing up in that the overall result is improving which is the case recently, just need to keep it going.

Dawes is uncanny on offense. He takes few 3s and that is not his thing so how do you guard him there? Others have been playing off him leaving the open 3 for the best position to guard the rim. However, but as a cutter or with the ball, he over produces going to the rim outside in. It will be interesting to see if teams can stop him without a zone defense.

Gabe’s outside shooting is in a funk and our improvement has come without his outside shooting. For the love of God, with what we have going, if his 3s return to form, everything should feed off each other and we could become dangerous even in this league.

[Holladay Ute]

The TCU road win is something that last year’s team couldn’t do. So I feel very encouraged. It seems like we have less talent this year (versus last year), but perhaps more grit. I think that will translate well to the game this weekend. It’s just one game (I guess two, if you count the OK State game) so I don’t think we should get our hopes up. We were blown out by 20-30 points three games in a row (to three of the best teams in the conference, to be fair). So again, we can’t get too high off the last two wins. I still think we’re a bottom feeder in the league, but 2-3 in conference play at this point in the schedule is better than I expected (I thought we’d be 1-4 at this point). It seems like our team has recently found something that works. And BYU, though talented, hasn’t been playing that well since conference play began. It’ll be interesting to see if BYU is able to adjust to what’s been working for us. What I like about the last two games is that we’ve played good defense.

[AdamDudeAmi]

This team has a lot of energy and enjoys each other and playing together. I love that and it’s super easy to support a squad like that win or lose. Man, I’ll lose it if we can get the W against the men of Swig State. Let’s go Utes!

[Author]

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