Utes boldly go where tradition carries on

Wow.

Cosmic.

For the Utes to end a six-game losing streak by beating nationally-ranked Air Force, 85-79, is nothing short of otherworldly. Speaking of which, what corner of space has this team been keeping itself, anyway?

In many ways, this Ute season has looked a lot like a 1967 episode of "Star Trek," called "Mirror, Mirror," in which an away team from the Starship Enterprise is caught in a transporter malfunction, hurtling it into a parallel universe. There, team members discover a disconcerting fact: Their counterparts from the alternate universe are their opposites.

Captain Kirk, Uhura, McCoy and Scotty have look-alikes that are evil, ruthless and anarchistic. Spock wears a menacing goatee and harbors murder in his heart.

Surely the Ute basketball team can relate. It must feel that for most of this year it has been in a universe in which the respected Utah program — rated by Street & Smith's as the 11th-greatest college basketball program of all time — became nearly helpless. Instead of All-Americans who execute with admirable precision, they became an insecure, error-prone collection of disparate parts. Those who should have been cool and collected were instead indecisive and impulsive.

As for the Huntsman Center crowd, well, that's been elsewhere, too. Most of the time it hasn't looked much larger than a full Enterprise crew of 430.

Meanwhile, in this strange dimension, the Air Force Academy became a basketball power, ranked as high as 11th in the nation. Captain Kirk, a.k.a. Utah coach Ray Giacoletti's job, then, has been to figure out how to get his crew back into the right time and place.

Shooting 71 percent from the field and 56 percent from 3-point range on Tuesday certainly didn't hurt.

With 11 games left, it didn't come any too soon for Giacoletti's liking. After losing six in a row, the Utes beat Air Force, 85-79. Six consecutive defeats hasn't happened to Utah since Gene Autry moved from radio and film to TV (1950). Utah's record through its first 17 games this year was the worst since 1972-73. Meanwhile, its 0-4 conference start was the worst since 1952-53. Had it lost Tuesday, it would have been the worst league start since 1936.

Either way, it's been a long, long time since the Utes got off to a start like this.