On Sunday afternoon, the Utes were unable to replicate their dominant performance from when they first played Arizona this season. Instead, the Wildcats dominated Utah right from the tip-off as the Utes lost their final Pac-12 regular season game 64-41.
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Ute head coach Anthony Levrets said the team did not have any issues with competitiveness, rather they just could not get it together.
“We did not play very well today,” Levrets said. “In this league, night in and night out, you got to be ready to go.”
After losing a 12-point lead to Arizona State on Friday night after putting up a fight for the entire game, Utah came out of this weekend winless. Even though Levrets entered 11 players into the game against the Wildcats, he said the team had trouble finding their rhythm.
“[We had] tired legs,” Levrets said. “It has really been hard for us all year long. The second day has really been hard for us. Second day on the road has been brutal.”
Arizona led by as many as 23 points in its Senior Day game and redshirt senior Candice Warthen took over for the Wildcats with 23 points on 10-of-13 shooting in her final game at the McKale Center.
Only two players managed to score in double figures for the Utes. Utah’s top scorer was Joseta Fatuesi with 12 points, 10 of which came in the first half, to go along with her nine rebounds. Cheyenne Wilson was next with 11 points, scoring nine from beyond the arc, as she was 3-of-5 from three-point range.
Utah had another long scoring drought in the second half and did not score a single point in the last 7:21 of the game. Whether it was the defensive pressure from the Wildcats or the several missed layups and close shots by Utah players, the Utes could not buy a bucket for the majority of the second half.
Wicijowski was in foul trouble early in the game, after committing two fouls with over eight minutes left to play in the first half. She then got called for her third foul quickly at the beginning of the second half.
Although she tallied three fouls with plenty of time on the clock, this did not stop her defensive effort, continuing to guard the paint as hard as before.
In the first half, the Utes fell down early by 10 points, but they rebounded back and took their first lead of the game after Wilson knocked down a three pointer to give Utah a one-point lead.
After some back and forth play from both teams, Arizona started to go on a another run, this time building their lead to eight points. Again, Wilson drained another long three to end the run for the Wildcats, but Arizona’s lead was 35-29 at halftime.
Levrets was disappointed by the team’s defensive effort.
“We didn’t start very good,” Levrets said. “Our middle wasn’t very good and our finish wasn’t very good. We’ve been able to avoid this sort of thing all year long, just sort of caught up with us and we didn’t have gas.”
For the game, Utah shot 27.1 percent from the floor, but in the second half they were 4-of-30, compared to Arizona who shot above 50 percent.
The Utes will now head to the Pac-12 tournament in Seattle on this coming Thursday night. They will face off against Washington for the third time this season in the first round.
@kbrenneisen