How College Basketball is Going for Utah's teams.

This year I am much busier at work and have only had the time to cover football.  Now that football is over, except for BYU and Utah State's bowls, I can concentrate on basketball.


Weber State and Southern Utah

The Big Sky Conference race appears to be a two-team race, and one of those teams is rebuilding.  Montana got blown out by BYU this last week without star Will Cherry.  He should be back in time for conference play to begin at the end of December.  Weber State has to rebuild the team after losing Damien Lillard to the NBA.  Randy Rahe seems to have done the job and the win at Dayton shows that they will be back this year.

It looks to be a long season for first year coach Nick Robinson at Southern Utah.  Sagarin has the Thunderbirds at the bottom of the Big Sky Conference.  They have no where to go but up.

Utah Valley

If the WAC can add enough teams, this will be the last season that the Wolverines will miss out on a chance to NCAA tournament.

Utah State

The Aggies will play their last season in the WAC.  But it is not expected to be a cake walk.  La Tech, New Mexico State, UT-Arlington and Denver will make certain that USU earns their WAC crown this season.  As much as I love what Stu Morrill has done in Logan, the Aggies will have to be better once they move to the MWC.  New Mexico and UNLV are great programs.  

Utah

Utah is probably still the cellar dweller in the PAC-12.  Watching what Clyburn did to BYU for Iowa State yesterday underscores the problems with the Utah program.  They have been able to recruit talent, but they have not been able to hold on to it.  They results in this inconsistency are showing on the scoreboard.  It's going to take some patience with the coaching staff and the players to get back to where they can compete.  If Larry Krystkowiak can't do it, the Utes will be down for a long time.

BYU

The Cougars have already lost 3 games this season.  That normally does not happen until conference play.  True, they had a challenging non-conference schedule.  Also true, they are not shooting like a Dave Rose coached BYU team.  They do not have the firepower to hang with Gonzaga.  They need to stay ahead of St. Mary's, Santa Clara, San Francisco and Pepperdine of they will have to be satisfied with playing in the NIT this year.

Power rankings, in-state

1. Utah State
2. BYU
3. Weber State
4. Utah Valley
5. Utah
6. Southern Utah