The Cougars ended their two-game losing streak with a win over the Utes. <\/p>\n
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) BYU center Lara Rohkohl (13) as BYU hosts Utah, NCAA basketball in Provo on Saturday, Jan. 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
Provo \u2022 Gavin Petersen didn\u2019t have to be reminded about the importance of this game.<\/p>\n
Coming off a much-needed win over No. 22 West Virginia this week, Utah and its head coach were in search of a second straight victory in the Big 12 to deepen its NCAA Tournament resume and climb up the conference standings.<\/p>\n
The Utes just so happened to be facing their in-state rival BYU on the road, and they walked into Provo and lost to the Cougars 77-65 on Saturday afternoon.<\/p>\n
After the Utes led by 10 points before halftime, BYU stormed back in the fourth quarter to take the game after Utah\u2019s offense went stagnant in the second half, shooting 8 of 30 from the field and 2 of 14 from range. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur second half woes finally caught up to us,\u201d Petersen said after the loss. \u201cWe\u2019ve got to figure out how to start our third quarters a little bit better. Our coaching staff will get after that to make sure we do that, so that doesn\u2019t keep reoccurring for us. Whether it\u2019s at home on the road \u2014 it doesn\u2019t matter \u2014the opponents in our conference are way too good to be spotting them points early on in that third period.”<\/p>\n
The Utes are now 15-7 on the season and 6-4 in conference play. The Cougars improved to 16-6 and 5-5 in the Big 12. <\/p>\n
\u201cTremendous game, just fun to be a part,\u201d BYU coach Lee Cummard said. \u201cThere\u2019s an emotion and energy that\u2019s different than other games. And we came out flat. First half wasn\u2019t great, not very connected and it was completely different in the second half. We had connectivity on both sides of the ball.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe competitive spirit that they showed in the second half was way, way better than the first half.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ute senior guard Lani White had a team-high 20 points.<\/p>\n
BYU\u2019s comeback efforts were led by sophomore guard\/forward Brinley Cannon, who finished with 21 points. The Shelley, Idaho, native had 15 points in the second half.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think they did a tremendous job of putting people in the pick and roll to have to either switch or help off of certain people,\u201d Petersen said. \u201cWe were missing our assignments. We\u2019ve talked about it over and over again \u2014 whether it was at practice or in between timeout \u2014 We\u2019ve just got to do a better job of when the lights are on and the clock is running. We\u2019ve got to be dialed in and not let those mistakes hurt us.\u201d <\/p>\n
After the first quarter, the Utes held a 18-14 lead over BYU, led in part by a team-high six points from White. The Utes extended their lead to a 35-25 margin by halftime, holding the Cougars to 10 of 29 mark from the field at the break.<\/p>\n
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) BYU players celebrate the win over Utah, NCAA basketball in Provo on Saturday, Jan. 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
The Cougars shrunk the Utes\u2019 lead to four points by the end of the third period. Utah went cold from the field, shooting 4 for 15 overall and 1 of 6 from three-point range in the third quarter. <\/p>\n
Petersen said BYU\u2019s defensive pressure on ball screens resulted in Utah going cold offensively. The Utes had 16 of their 22 overall turnovers in the third and fourth quarters on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think, for sure, it was an effort thing,\u201d Cannon said. \u201cI think coming out of halftime, we had more intensity defensively, and that kind of just led to more turnovers and then fueled our offense.\u201d <\/p>\n
BYU took its first lead of the game with 8:45 left in the contest off a bucket from Cannon beyond the arc, putting the U. down 54-52. BYU ended the game on a 9-0 run, icing the game in its favor with a 12-point win. <\/p>\n
Next the Utes travel to take on UCF at 5 p.m. MST on Wednesday, Feb. 5, in Orlando, Florida. BYU too will also hit the road to take on Kansas at 5:30 p.m. MST in Lawrence, Kansas.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got to bounce back and not let one loss become two,\u201d Petersen said. \u201cThat\u2019s when it can become dangerous, when you show up on Monday, and you have that loser\u2019s limp and everybody\u2019s kind of in their feelings. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s turn the page, tip your hat and move on.\u201d <\/p>\n
Note to readers \u2022 This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cougars ended their two-game losing streak with a win over the Utes. (Trent Nelson | The Salt…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":574042,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3723],"tags":[7,217,231,772,1544,1955,15557],"class_list":["post-574041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-basketball","tag-basketball","tag-college-basketball","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-basketball","tag-ncaab","tag-university-of-utah","tag-utes"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115992646213038680","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=574041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/574042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=574041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=574041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=574041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}