Utes Handle Loss With Composure
The mood in the locker room following the Utes' mostly disastrous 84-71 loss to Arizona in the first round of the NCAA Tournament last night was disappointed, as you might imagine.
But coach Jim Boylen clearly did a good job of convincing everybody that they had simply had a bad night at the wrong time, rather than anything worse than that. The players were disappointed, sure, but not inconsolable, or completely devastated -- seemingly following Boylen's lead in saying that "it wasn't one of our better nights, but you know, that happens."
Indeed, it does.
Certainly, the Utes wish they would have performed better on the national stage to help validate -- in the eyes of others, at least -- their championship season in the Mountain West Conference. But the fact is, that would have been merely gravy on what already had turned into a remarkable season for a group of players who were also largely responsible for one of the worst periods in program history just a couple of years ago.
That the season evaporated in the fumes of Arizona's ferocious, full-court press almost hardly mattered in the big picture.
"Yeah, you don't script it to start that way," Boylen acknowledged. "You don't talk to your team about starting that way. But we've had bad starts before and won. We got it to two. We turned the ball over when we got it to two and then the game kind of separated again.
"My guys battled," he added. "I thought 'Utah' across their chest meant something today, and I'm proud of what we did. We didn't win, and that's the tough thing about this business. Somebody wins, somebody loses. But we're going to keep building this program. We're going to keep getting tougher. We're lifting Monday morning at six o'clock. The beat goes on."
But coach Jim Boylen clearly did a good job of convincing everybody that they had simply had a bad night at the wrong time, rather than anything worse than that. The players were disappointed, sure, but not inconsolable, or completely devastated -- seemingly following Boylen's lead in saying that "it wasn't one of our better nights, but you know, that happens."
Indeed, it does.
Certainly, the Utes wish they would have performed better on the national stage to help validate -- in the eyes of others, at least -- their championship season in the Mountain West Conference. But the fact is, that would have been merely gravy on what already had turned into a remarkable season for a group of players who were also largely responsible for one of the worst periods in program history just a couple of years ago.
That the season evaporated in the fumes of Arizona's ferocious, full-court press almost hardly mattered in the big picture.
"Yeah, you don't script it to start that way," Boylen acknowledged. "You don't talk to your team about starting that way. But we've had bad starts before and won. We got it to two. We turned the ball over when we got it to two and then the game kind of separated again.
"My guys battled," he added. "I thought 'Utah' across their chest meant something today, and I'm proud of what we did. We didn't win, and that's the tough thing about this business. Somebody wins, somebody loses. But we're going to keep building this program. We're going to keep getting tougher. We're lifting Monday morning at six o'clock. The beat goes on."
posted by www.sltrib.com @ 7:30 AM |
2 Comments:
Next year's line up....Carlon Brown, David Foster, Kim Tillie, Morgan Grimm, Luka Drca, are all Giac's recruits. When Boylen was hired the recruits that signed that first year with him were already booked by Giac, he had to get them to agree to stay with the committment but at that point they didn't really have a choice. So far....Tavita is the only Boylen recruit to see any action......and I didn't see greatness, not trying to degrade Tavita, just sayin' as a freshmen, he was okay. This year, all the top high school in state recruits signed with the Y, even Giac went to the sweet 16 with Majerus' recruits. Can Boylen recruit? That is the question! So far.........hard to get overly excited. But we can hope!
I agree, hard to get excited but I am impressed that the Utes are good losers. May they have many opportunities under Boylen to handle many losses with great composure.
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