Utah Utes basketball: Wildcats are a dangerous foe

OGDEN — It's been a decade since the Weber State basketball team has defeated Utah at the Dee Events Center. You have to go back to Dec. 1, 1999, when the Wildcats, behind Eddie Gill and Harold Arceneaux, beat Rick Majerus' Utes 84-72.

The Wildcats did beat the Utes a year later in Salt Lake, but Utah has won the past eight games between the two schools, all by double-figure margins except for a 67-62 overtime win in 2005.

Tonight's game at the Dee Events Center (7 p.m.) might be the Wildcats' best chance to beat the Utes in several years. The Utes have a young team that has been inconsistent all year, while the Wildcats have a veteran team with four starters back from last year's Big Sky Conference regular-season championship team.

The Utes do have a better record this year at 3-3 compared to Weber's 1-4 mark, which includes losses on the road to BYU, UC-Santa Barbara and Seattle. The other loss was at home to Utah State, while the win came against Western State.

Utah has two common opponents, having beaten Utah State at home and losing to Seattle at home. Utah coach Jim Boylen calls Weber, "the best 1-4 team anybody could play" and points out the Wildcats were tied with BYU midway through the second half in Provo before the Cougars pulled away.

"I think Randy Rahe has done a great job of bringing in his kind of guys," said Boylen. "They have great speed, great quickness, they have multiple ball-handlers. They can play an up-tempo style and they want to play fast, especially in their building. It will be a true road game for us, which we need, and it will be a challenge."

Sophomore guard Damian Lillard leads the Wildcats in scoring (19.4 ppg) and assists (2.4), while another sophomore, forward Kyle Bullinger, scores 11.2 ppg. Center Steve Panos, who prepped at Highland High School, leads the team in rebounding at 5.4 per game while scoring 9.8 per game. A pair of JC transfers, Lindsey Hughey (8.0 ppg) and Franklin Session (6.6 ppg), have split time at the point position, while senior guard Nick Hansen (7.0 ppg) is the other starter.

So far this year, the Wildcats have been turnover-prone with 56 assists compared to 72 turnovers. And like Utah, the Wildcats have had problems shooting, averaging just 41.8 percent from the field and 28.8 percent from 3-point range. Utah averages 42.7 from the field and 29.5 percent from 3-point range.

Utah is coming off a second-place finish at the Las Vegas Invitational, where it knocked off No. 20 Illinois in the semifinals before falling to Oklahoma State in the finals.