Utah (15-12, 7-9) at No. 22 Arizona (18-9, 12-4) | McKale Center | 7 p.m. Wednesday | ESPN+ | 1290-AM
Probable starters
ARIZONA
G Jaden Bradley (6-3 junior)
G Caleb Love (6-4 senior)
F Anthony Dell’Orso (6-6 junior)
F Henri Veesaar (7-0 sophomore)
C Tobe Awaka (6-8 junior)
UTAH
G Mike Sharavjamts (6-9 junior)
G Gabe Madsen (6-6 senior)
F Jake Wahlin (6-10 sophomore)
F Ezra Ausar (6-8 junior)
C Lawson Lovering (7-1 senior)
How they match up
Series history: Arizona leads 40-32 against its rival from the Border Conference, Pac-12 and now Big 12, winning five of the past six and both games last season. But the Utes took UA into triple overtime at the Huntsman Center last season before the Wildcats pulled out a 105-99 win.
Utah overview: The Utes were moving through their first Big 12 season with a 7-9 record after a 76-72 loss at UCF on Sunday when Utah fired coach Craig Smith on Monday. Utah made assistant coach Josh Eilert an interim head coach for the second straight season after he took over West Virginia last season in the wake of Bob Huggins’ departure.
The Utes are 7-6 in their last 13 Big 12 games, having beaten Kansas and Kansas State at home before losing a game at UCF in which they turned the ball over 19 times. They have a below-average turnover percentage of 18.1% but they are a capable two-point shooting team (54.8%). Defensively, Utah holds opponents to just 46.4% from two-point range and blocks 10.9% of opponents shots.
With a team ranked No. 3 in Kenpom’s average height ranking (adjusted for minutes played), the Utes start a 6-9 point guard in Mike Sharavjamts, a 6-10 small forward in Jake Wahlin and a 7-1 center in Lawson Lovering. Gabe Madsen is the Utes’ leading scorer and veteran wing, taking more than a third of his shots from 3-point range while hitting free throws at an 84.3% rate when he gets to the line.
He said it: Despite the coaching change, "I feel like the most important thing is still the five guys on the court. They haven't really changed. They've got some weapons, and they've been doing a good job of utilizing them, especially recently. So we're going to pair with the footage we had and then go from there.
“They're really good at keeping that ball moving, sharing the ball and just finding great shots from good opportunities. I think it's more a stylistic thing. I think one of their values is ball movement and passing. So they showcase that from top to bottom.
“(Sharavjamts) is kind of, like (Egor Demin) from BYU. He fits that same kind of archetype, a big guard, more of a facilitator, but can score. His 3 number isn't high but he's definitely not afraid to shoot.
"(Madsen) kind of plays the Caleb Love role. He's going to come off screens. They kind of treat him like a Steph Curry. He's definitely trending up. A good athlete, has good size.
"(Wahlin) is a 6-10 wing who's more comfortable shooting 3s. He doesn’t shoot at a high volume, but his numbers say he's a rock-solid shooter. He's not the quickest guy but he definitely has a higher basketball IQ, so when he's off the ball, he's gonna be setting screens for other guys, looking to get his teammates open and then crashing the board.
“(Ausar) has just been dominating the paint. He's shot the 3 a few times, but he's more a straight-line driver. He's a post-up guy, a physical athlete, extremely athletic and bouncy. Not the tallest guy, but he plays with force.
"(Defensively) I haven't seen much zone from them, but they did zone against UCF and they did zone against us last season. So I'm sure we'll see it at some point, but they've mainly been a man-to-man team. They've switched one through five in certain lineups, and then they've also switched one through four in certain lineups.
“I think they do a good job of packing the paint and protecting the paint. So we need to be great with with our ball movement and our passing. We can't let their length disrupt our timing, our passing angles and things like that. We've gotta be in continuous movement on offense." — UA assistant coach Ken Nakagawa, who scouted the Utes
Key players
Utah — Gabe Madsen
The Utes’ fifth-year point guard won’t need an adjustment to McKale Center or the Wildcats: He’s already faced UA five times, hitting 3 of 7 3-pointers in Utah’s December 2022 upset of Arizona, and was a combined 9 for 19 from 3-point range in two games against the Wildcats last season.
Arizona guard Caleb Love (2) shoots as Utah guard Gabe Madsen (55) defends during the second overtime of a game on Feb. 8, 2024, in Salt Lake City.
Arizona — Henri Veesaar
The height advantage Veesaar has enjoyed against opposing big men might be negated against the third-tallest team in college basketball. But UA’s 7-foot redshirt sophomore has hit a more consistent stride in the month of February, when he’s taken over the starting power forward job from Trey Townsend.
Arizona forward Henri Veesaar (13) reels in a lob into the paint in the second half against BYU at McKale Center on Feb. 22, 2025.
Sidelines
Self-revealing opportunity
After some Arizona fans became the latest group to offer up an anti-LDS chant after the Wildcats lost to BYU, generating a statement from UA athletic director Desireé Reed-Francois saying it was “not reflective of who we are,” Salt Lake Tribune columnist Gordon Monson suggested a new response.
Monson, who said he has previously condemned similar chants, wrote that fans opposing BYU should just go ahead and say what they want.
“Let it rip,” Monson wrote. “Scream away, all the night long … don’t limit the chants to just this one. Hell, no. Add in every other profane word that their minds can conjure and allow them to use them any which creative way they want.
“Contrary to what Reed-Francois said, let the people reveal by what they do and shout who they really are. That does more harm to them than any kind of weak apology that has no real effect.”
Monson also noted that since BYU likes to use its sports teams to generate interest and/or curiosity about the LDS faith, incidents such as Saturday’s could draw attention to it.
“The story about what some Arizona fans did at the end of Saturday night’s game has already been noted on the internet, printed and broadcast from coast to coast. You can’t buy that kind of publicity,” Monson wrote, later adding: “I know, this might seem a revolutionary approach, a capitulation. But it just might work to an advantage.
“And if it doesn’t, it’ll be because nobody chants vulgarities at BYU games anymore. It’ll simply fade away. And that always was the hope from the beginning.”
Old UA foes surface for Utes job
Two former Utah standouts who helped lead the Utes over defending national champion Arizona in a 1998 Elite Eight shocker surfaced on a Deseret News list of five potential candidates to replace Smith: Andre Miller and Alex Jensen.
Miller, who went on to play 17 seasons in the NBA, is currently the head coach of the Denver Nuggets’ G League affiliate in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Jensen is an assistant coach for the Dallas Mavericks who has also served as a Utah Jazz assistant.
Other names on the Deseret News list: New Mexico coach Richard Pitino, GCU coach Bryce Drew and Johnnie Bryant, who played for Utah from 2005-06 to 2007-08 and is now a Cleveland Cavaliers assistant coach.
Cougars clinch tie
No. 4-ranked Houston's 69-61 win at No. 10 Texas Tech on Monday meant the Cougars clinched a first-place tie for the Big 12 title, but UA coach Tommy Lloyd said it didn't change his approach. UA is three games behind Houston in second place.
"Obviously they were trending to do that," said Lloyd, whose Wildcats lost to Houston on Feb. 15 at McKale. "Houston's having an incredible season."
Numbers game
46.0: Two-point shooting percentage defense of Utah opponents, the 21st-best defensive two-point percentage in Division I
62.7: Utah’s free throw shooting percentage, third worst in Division I
67.4: Utah’s ratio of assists to made field goals, the best rate in Division I
— Bruce Pascoe
