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Las Vegas
Lorenzo Bonam's driving layup in the Pac-12 tournament semifinals may live forever in Utah basketball history, but the good feelings generated by his dramatic play of the previous night lasted barely more than a minute of Saturday's game.
That's how long it took Ute coach Larry Krystkowiak to bench Bonam in an 88-57 loss to Oregon, symbolizing the extremes of Utah's efforts over about 18 hours at the MGM Grand Garden Arena.
One big problem emerged from Utah's overtime win over California. The Utes were forced to play Oregon, instead of celebrating all weekend. And the Ducks embarrassed them in the championship game.
The Utes killed themselves with 13 first-half turnovers, allowed stunning numbers of drives down the lane and offensive rebounds, struggled offensively and trailed 60-30 midway through the second half. "We didn't show an elite performance tonight," said Ute guard Brandon Taylor, excelling in understatement.
Bonam's last basket of the weekend came Friday night. All-America center Jakob Poeltl scored 13 points, but that below-average production extended his personal struggles against the undersized Ducks.
Oregon's three victories over Utah this season came by a total of 59 points. Losing three times to the Pac-12 champions is not a complete disgrace for the Utes (26-8), but you'd sure like to believe the second-place team could compete more respectably. The Ducks were just too athletic, too aggressive and too motivated to give the Utes any chance of hanging around in this game.
Maybe the Utes just have an Oregon problem, considering they had won nine straight games since a 10-point loss Feb. 7 in Eugene.
Whatever the case, Oregon's 25-8 closing run in the first half took all the fun out of it for Ute fans, who otherwise would have created a home-court advantage in Arizona's absence from the title game. The Utes would have been better off if the Wildcats had completed their remarkable comeback against Oregon in the semifinals. Arizona may have won Saturday — but not by 31.
As it was, the Utes looked a lot like the 2013 team that was seeded No. 10 and pulled off two tournament upsets before being blasted by Oregon in the semifinals. They didn't resemble last year's club that lost to the Ducks on a buzzer-beating 3-pointer. All Krystkowiak could do most of the night was stand on the sideline with his arms folded, staring straight ahead, and think of rationalizations for this performance and regrouping strategy for what's to come.
"Personally, I've always been a big fan or a big believer that everything happens for a reason, and I like being humbled before the biggest phase of this season starts," Krystkowiak said. "... I do think some corrections in life are good."
Oregon coach Dana Altman could empathize with the Utes, after his team lost 80-52 to Arizona in the championship game last March. The way everything played out Saturday "was not the game we anticipated," Altman said, "but we just got on a roll, and that happens, just like Arizona got on a roll last year against us."
So what's lost for Utah? Pride and credibility, mostly — and the prizes that would have come with winning, such as a possible No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament and a Pac-12 trophy.
Krystkowiak took this event seriously, that's for sure. He wanted a title that he considers more important than the regular-season conference championship. That viewpoint is debatable, but the fact is that Utah's athletic program gets only a few genuine shots at Pac-12 titles outside of gymnastics, and this weekend was one of those opportunities.
The Utes couldn't capitalize on their title shot, made possible by two wins over NCAA Tournament-bound teams. After two dramatic finishes in regulation, including Bonam's tying drive, Krystkowiak labeled the Pac-12 semifinals "March Madness at its finest." The same certainly could not be said of the Utes' performance in the championship game.
Krystkowiak was barely exaggerating late Friday night when he said the next tipoff was "actually today," while observing that "both teams are probably running on fumes."
One of them fit that description, anyway. "It's no excuse, because they were just as tired," Krystkowiak said.
Just getting to this point was meaningful, considering that in the Utes' five years in the Pac-12, the only title-game contestants have been Colorado, Arizona, UCLA, Oregon and Utah. One of those five teams looked like it didn't belong on this stage, though.
When the score stood 13-13, it seemed unlikely that either of these teams was fresh enough to blow out the other. But then Utah crumbled as Oregon closed the first half with a 25-8 run The Utes left Las Vegas with regrets, wishing that everyone would remember only what happened the night before.
Twitter: @tribkurt