The Thursday night matchup between the U and San Diego State women’s basketball teams was so ugly, not even a French figure skating judge could give it style points.
Pretty or not, though, the Utes will take the 47-45 win they got over the Aztecs.
In their second-to-last game of the regular season, the Utes scored their fourth win in their last five games to continue their pre-conference tourney surge, improving to 14-11 overall, 7-6 MWC in the process.
Kelsy Stireman had a steal and a layup to put Utah up 46 45 with 15 ticks left, then hit a freebie with four seconds to go for the final margin.
Still, Utah had to overcome some grizzly shooting to get to that point. Despite finding the bottom of the twine just 39.6 percent of the time from the field, and an abysmal 45.5 percent from the line, the Utes were actually the more accurate team on the court.
SDSU’s cause was hindered by connecting on just 15-of-56 shots?26.8 percent for the game.
Utah had but one player hit double figures?though even senior small forward Lindsay Herbert’s 12 points came on a less-than-proficient 5-of-15 shooting spree.
Meanwhile, committing 24 turnovers and having to start freshman Lana Sitterud at shooting guard in place of senior Erin Gibbons, the team’s top scorer who did not play, kept the U uncomfortably close to an Aztec team that dropped to 10-16 overall, and 2-11 in league play.
While San Diego State was less sloppy with the ballhandling (a relatively paltry 14 turnovers), it likewise had just one double-figure scorer, as reserve Tanisha Knight posted an eerily similar dozen points on a 5-for-15 clip.
The Utes now wrap up the season Saturday when they head to Vegas to battle conference power UNLV, which features the MWC’s top player in senior forward Linda Frhlich.