Ball bounces Air Force's way

Any chance the Utah basketball team had of adding another league championship to its gaudy collection slipped away in a matter of seconds Saturday afternoon — the time it took Air Force's Joel Gerlach to chase down a loose ball and drive for a layup.

Gerlach was fouled with 1.4 seconds left and his two free throws gave the Falcons a shocking 59-57 victory and a near-lock on the Mountain West Conference regular-season title.

The fluke play, after Utah was trying for the final shot of a tie game, gave the Falcons an unlikely victory and erased a lot of bad memories at the Huntsman Center. With its first win there since 1989, Air Force improved to 19-4 on the season and 9-1 in Mountain West Conference play.

For the second straight game, the Utes failed to secure win No. 20 as they dropped to 7-4 in MWC play and 19-7 overall. To get a share of the title, the Utes will need to win their remaining three games and hope Air Force loses at least three of its final four games.

The Ute players and coaches were clearly upset by the loss afterward. Some players went the back way out of the Huntsman Center tunnel to avoid the media and the ones who talked were clearly perturbed.

"It came down to the last play and that was the difference," said Nick Jacobson, who led Utah with 22 points.

"The rebound went 50 feet from the rim and they got a wide-open run at the rim. That's just the way it goes."

"The ball just bounced away," said Tim Frost. "It was unlucky."

"I thought the kids played hard," said Ute interim coach Kerry Rupp.

"They did what we told them to do on the last play. They all went to the offensive boards. To their credit, (Air Force) tipped it out, picked it up and got the shot."

Here's how the crazy final sequence unfurled:

After AFA's Nick Welch sank two free throws with 37.1 seconds left to tie it at 57-57, the Utes had a chance for the last shot and, at worst, seemed headed for five minutes of overtime. However, there was a two-second differential between the shot clock and the game clock and that turned out to be critical.

Jacobson held the ball near the halfcourt line for about 15 seconds before handing the ball to Tim Drisdom. With nine seconds left, Drisdom drove toward the middle and, at the 6-second mark, tried a fall-away 12-footer from the right angle.