Utah Utes basketball: Utes take to the road for tough Pac-12 pair

SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah and Stanford basketball teams share a pretty good history, going back to the first meeting between the two schools in 1932.

The two schools were together at the Final Four in San Antonio in 1998, when they would have met in the finals if the Cardinal hadn't lost in overtime to Kentucky. The previous year, the two met in the West Regional semifinals in San Jose, where the Utes pulled out an 82-77 victory in overtime. Back in 1969, Stanford was the opponent for the first-ever game at the Huntsman Center, which was called Special Events Center at the time.

In all, the Utes and Cardinal have met 21 times on the basketball floor with the Utes winning 14 of those contests.

However, Thursday night's game at Maples Pavilion (8 p.m. MT) will mark the first-ever matchup between the two schools as Pac-12 members and will be just the second game between the pair since the 1973-74 season.

The Cardinal and Utes are on opposite ends of the Pac-12 standings. Stanford enjoys the best record in the league at 13-3 overall and sits in second place in Pac-12 play at 3-1. Meanwhile Utah is just 4-11, the worst overall record in the league, and 1-2 in conference play.

"They're awfully good," Krystkowiak said of Stanford. "They have so many weapons and run their stuff so well."

However, he's not as concerned about the Cardinal team, as he is about what his own team must do.

"We need to keep the tempo in our favor," he said. "We have to be really disciplined and do a great job defensively. We can't turn it over and take bad shots. We have to put together our best game of the year to keep up with them."

The Utes are 0-7 in games away from the Huntsman Center. They played some of their best basketball of the season last week in wins over Washington State and a close loss to Washington.

"Now we need to take that out on the road," Krystkowiak said.

Stanford has a well-balanced lineup, led by senior forward Josh Owens, who leads the team in scoring (13.0 ppg) and rebounding (6.1 rpg). Sophomore point guard Aaron Bright averages 12.5 points and 3.3 assists per game, while freshman guard Chasson Randle is scoring 11.9 points, but may come off the bench against Utah.

The Cardinal are coming off a thrilling four-overtime 103-101 victory over Oregon State in Corvallis. Two days earlier they suffered their only Pac-12 loss at Oregon.