Utah Basketball doesn’t have a very prominent history but nonetheless stays competitive. Since winning the first men’s basketball national championship in 1944 they haven’t even been able to make it back to the big game since.

Things may be on the move although after back to back bad seasons in the past, we’ve seen a complete shift from the Runnin Utes and becoming a very feared team out of the Pac12. No one wants to play this squad

On the other hand BYU basketball has had much more tournament success than the Utes and have had very good players come through their programs. Players like Jimmer Fredette have come through and have had a very big hand in creating the successful basketball program.

Last Saturday the Utes hosted the Cougars in the Huntsman Center. Many expectations of how the game would go were very poor for the utes. One reporter for fanisider.com said “If you look up almost any stat, you’ll find BYU in the Top 10 as the Cougars are one of the most balanced teams in the country. They pass and share the ball well, they shoot well, they defend well and they don’t commit turnovers. So far, the Cougars haven’t shown any weaknesses this season, however, will the first true road game of the season in a hostile environment change that? We’ll see.” 

This reporters prediction would be wrong as the Cougars would shoot a terrible 23.3% from three and were off about everywhere else having a 36.6% field goal %. This allowed the Utes to take advantage on offense and play a pretty good defense once BYU started missing shots.

This could be Utah’s turning point after beating a nationally ranked squad. Utah’s chances of making the went up 15% after beating BYU up to 86% and if they can show the nation they are there to play this could set them up with better recruits for a long time.