The Runnin’ Utes dropped back-to-back games on the road in Oregon this last weekend, and although there were some positives in those two losses, head coach Larry Krystkowiak thinks his team got complacent, especially against Oregon State.
With 2.2 seconds left in the game, the Utes had a one-point lead over OSU. Then, as Stephen Thompson Jr. was attempting a last-second heave from half court, Brandon Taylor fouled him. Thompson Jr. went on to make all three of his free throws, and Oregon State won the contest.
However, Krystkowiak doesn’t place all the blame on Taylor. He blames it on a series of mental mistakes that happened in Thursday night’s closing minutes.
With about five minutes left in the game, the Utes had a 10-point lead over the Beavers. Then Jakob Poeltl went to the bench, and the home team immediately attacked the paint. Krystkowiak called a timeout to quiet the crowd, but the Utes were not ready when they stepped back onto the court and botched an in-bounds play, giving the ball, and momentum, back to Oregon State. Utah soon missed a box-out on a free throw, allowing OSU to get another basket.
Krystkowiak hopes these mental lapses won’t happen again moving forward, but he needs his team to take more pride in the way it wins or loses.
“We got to be dialed in and take pride in our possessions,” Krystkowiak said. “I have no problem getting beat. I don’t like when we make mistakes and we feel like we beat ourselves.”
Compassion
Krystkowiak practices yoga on a regular basis, attending sessions almost every other day. While it’s certainly harder to practice yoga while the team is on the road, he uses what he learns in the studio to help his team on the court.
Monday morning, he got back at it, and compassion was the topic of this week’s lesson. Compassion is already a key word in the Utah program, so he was all ears as his instructor was explaining what the word meant to her. Compassion is not just feeling sorry for someone or sympathizing with them — it’s how a group people band together and try to change something.
In this case, the players need to level themselves with one another because it wasn’t just one player, or even one play, that lost the last two games.
“Compassion is more of the concept that you have to struggle together,” Krystkowiak said. “Take action rather than feeling something for someone. Jump in their shoes with them and try to lift them up and help them.”
Confidence needs work
While compassion can certainly play its role for the team, Krystkowiak needs his players to be tougher and more confident in what they are doing because he cannot be the lone motivating force.
Krystkowiak does everything possible to empower his team, but when they throw the ball into the stands, even he struggles to find that silver lining. It’s up to the players to move on from that mistake and look for ways to make up for it. The coaching staff only asks the players to do things they know they are capable of — they just need to do their part.
“Let’s ask our guys to be smarter and less mistake-prone,” Krystkowiak said. “Let’s take some ownership and put on our big boy pants. I don’t want to chew guys or punish anybody, but we’re at the point in the season where we’re going to get it or not, and we’ve learned enough lessons where if we don’t play very intelligently, that can be just as disastrous as not playing hard.”
So while Krystkowiak will be asking for his team to not only play smarter against Washington on Wednesday night, he’ll also be asking them to play with more effort and more passion, nothing the team shouldn’t be able to handle. With only seven more Pac-12 games left on the schedule, they don’t have time to mess around.
@kbrenneisen