A week ago, I would of put BYU in as a win. The Utes were busy getting run off of Big 12 courts…lost at home to TTU by 28 pts. Two road games, Baylor and ISU by about 20 ppg.
Now they have put two good wins together and gotten some confidence
BYU has pay attention to Gabe Madson, Sr. guard takes by far the most shots of anybody. Don’t get him get open looks at 3. Don’t know what happened to his Bro. Mason, injured?
Keuno Dawes has 2 great latest games inside along with 7’1 Lovering.
BYU’s length at guard puts pressure on opposing teams passing lanes and shot selection.
BYU is better then Utah but playing on the road in SLCity makes for a tight game.
Both defenses are equal but BYU is much better on offense.
Ya, they always have these 7 footers and we get 6’9" or 6’5" centers. Keba will be sharp and he knows the court well too. Foos will dominate and get their bigs into foul trouble.
Mags will likely be on Madson. Saunders may take him as well. The key will be the bench. Catchings has to start playing like he can. That includes more effort on defense as well. No stupid techs. I say we will end up pulling away in the second half.
Dawes and Lovering both decided against Pope and for Utah, both transferred into Utah for Smith…
They look like the best players on the team for the rest of the season. I was hoping Dawes would choose BYU after a mission but Rice and Utah gave him other ideas.
Better recruting of the best of the LDS athletes needs to be a focus going forward…
In terms of raw talent this may be as good as BYU has ever been, however, this hasn’t been a cohesive team except for a few occasions. If they can come close to playing up to their talent level they should beat Utah.
They need to keep the turnovers down to about 10 and shoot 35% from 3 and shoot better than 45% overall and defend the 3. They haven’t been able to do any of that on the road. It is about time they did and this is as good an opportunity to get a road win as they are going to get. If they perform on the road as they have all year they will lose.
The next 3 games are very winnable. If they can’t turn around the season now forget it. It will be an NIT year at best.