Utah announced Wednesday that it has scheduled a game against national powerhouse Kansas to be played almost exactly a year from now. The Utes and Jayhawks will play Dec. 13, 2014 in the Sprint Center in Kansas City, so while the contest will be much closer to the Kansas campus than Salt Lake City, it will be considered a neutral site game.
Utah head coach Larry Krystkowiak has said in the past that his goal is to schedule tougher non-conference opponents, and a game against one of the nation’s perennial powers is a step in that direction, although Krystkowiak didn’t have much to say about it Wednesday.
“You guys wanted to talk about BYU before Idaho State and now we got BYU and we are talking about Kansas,” Krystkowiak said. “I’m confused.”
Sophomore forward Jordan Loveridge did offer his thoughts about playing the Jayhawks, who currently sit at No. 13 in the AP Top 25 poll and are tied for fourth all-time for most Final Four appearances with 14.
“It just shows that our program is building,” Loveridge said. “We can play teams like that now, so it’s just good for the program.”
The announcement came on the heels of recent speculation that the BYU-Utah basketball rivalry may be in jeopardy. On his weekly radio show on KSL, BYU head coach Dave Rose recently said talks regarding the renewal of a contract for the teams to play have stalled. The current contract between the Utes and Cougars ends with next season’s game in Provo.
Krystkowiak seemed to be taken aback by the questions about the future of the rivalry.
“I would love to continue playing them,” he said. “I don’t know why [Rose] would say that.”
Krystkowiak said there have been talks recently between the two sides and renewing the contract just wasn’t something he was ready to do. He wants to see what other options might be available, but made it clear that he is still very interested in keeping the rivalry alive. Krystkowiak said he hopes the game can be played at EnergySolutions Arena once every three years so that in every three-year span, one game can be played on each team’s home floor and one can be played on a neutral site.
With next season’s rivalry game already on the schedule, the Utes and Cougars have more than a year to work out a new agreement to keep playing each other.