Utah State saw its name drawn for the 2025 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, earning a seven seed in the Midwest section of the bracket and a matchup with 10-seed UCLA set for Thursday in Lexington, Kentucky. It’s the Aggies’ third straight appearance in the tournament — each under a different head coach — and is the fifth time in the previous six NCAA Tournaments they’ve been included.
There was no guarantee that Utah State would be picked in the tournament, even though every single bracketologist on record had the Aggies in the field of 68. And there was some nervousness building in the room of USU’s watch party as the South and East sections of the brackets were revealed. But as the Midwest section was unfurled on TV, head coach Jerrod Calhoun provided some encouragement and a prediction.
“It’s always scary when it gets down to the last couple brackets,” USU guard Mason Falslev said of watching the selection show. “But Coach [Calhoun] came and he was just like, ‘I think we’re going to be 7-10.'”
Calhoun turned out to be exactly right as the Aggies were soon after shown on the screen.
The scene from Utah State’s watch party as they learn they were picked as a 10 seed to face UCLA. pic.twitter.com/oAV900VjF8
— Jason Walker (@jwalker_sports) March 16, 2025
This is the fifth time in its history that Utah State has been selected as a 10 seed, the most recent other one being the 2023 tournament and the rest coming in the 1970s and 80s. The Aggies are 0-4 as the 10 seed, having faced teams with a combined eight future NBA players in those contests. The two closes games were the losses in 1983 (64-59 vs Iowa) and 1988 (80-77 to Vanderbilt).
Utah State’s history as a 10 seed in the NCAA Tournament.
Overall Record: 0-4
Average Margin: -7.02022-23 Season
– Lost 76-65 to Missouri in first round in Sacramento
– Aggies ranked 10th in nation in 3P% but shot 4 of 24 from deep that day
– Two future NBA players, D’Moi…— Jason Walker (@jwalker_sports) March 16, 2025
UCLA ranks highly in pretty much every team raking metric. Both the NET and KenPom placed the Bruins 27th compared to Utah State being 37th in the NET and 52nd in KenPom. The Bruins finished fourth in their first season in the Big Ten, going 13-7 in league play and 22-10 overall. The high rank for head coach Mick Cronin’s squad comes despite a bit of an up-and-down regular season. UCLA started the year with a 10-1 record (of note, the one loss was to New Mexico), ranking as high as 15th in the AP Top 25 Poll before losing five out of six games at essentially the start of Big Ten play put the Bruins in a serious slump. The Bruins recovered somewhat with a seven-game win streak, but finished the season by going 4-4 in their final eight games.
Utah State head coach Jerrod Calhoun speaks with members of the media after the Aggies were picked to be in the 2025 NCAA Tournament
“Mick does a great job. His teams are really, really physical. They’re tough. The tenacity they play on both sides of the ball is very real,” Calhoun said. “Ball security will be critical. And we’re going to need to try to speed them up as well in forced tempo. We need to get this game in the high 70s, 80s is what like we’ll try to play it.”
The Bruins boast a very balanced group of players, with no players averaging more than 14 points per game, or more than six rebounds per game, or even 3.5 assists per night. But UCLA has seven players averaging north of 6.3 points per game, one of only 34 teams in the nation that can say as much. One of UCLA’s top players, Tyler Bilodeau, has a connection with a current Utah State player. Bilodeau was teammates with Dexter Akanno for two seasons at Oregon State. This year for UCLA, Bilodeau has averaged a team-leading 13.6 points along with 4.5 rebounds (second on the team), 1.5 assists and 0.9 steals. He also leads the team in 3-point percentage, making 40.2 percent of his attempts.
The two other top producers for UCLA are a pair of sophomores — forward Eric Dailey, a transfer from Oklahoma State who’s averaged 11.3 points, 4.1 rebounds, 1.4 assists and 1.3 steals, along with another guard Sebastian Mack, averaging 10.0 points, 2.2 rebounds and 1.8 assists.
A core aspect of UCLA’s team is an elite defense. The Bruins rank 17th in KenPom’s adjusted defense metric, which will do battle with the Aggies’ elite offense that also happens to rank 17th, but in KenPom’s adjusted offense instead.
“I think I like the matchup,” USU guard Ian Martinez said. “And this is the time that we play for. So I know not only me, but the rest of the team is just excited to go out there to Lexington and just play some hoops.”
The game is scheduled for 7:25 p.m. Mountain Daylight Time on Thursday and will air on TNT.
Utah State has a notable amount of history with UCLA in the NCAA Tournament, though not much that is favorable to the Aggies. The first-ever meeting of the Bruins and Aggies took place in the 1962 regional semifinal (technically the Elite Eight by today’s standards, but back then there were only 25 teams in the field). Utah State had defeated its first-round foe Arizona State 78-73 but lost to the John Wooden-led Bruins 73-62. Cornell Green scored 26 points and had 16 rebounds to lead the Aggies in the losing effort against UCLA’s stars, John Green and Gary Cunningham.
Just under a decade later, in the 1969-70 season, the Aggies would run into the buzz saw that the Wooden-era Bruins had become. UCLA were in the middle of an eventual seven straight NCAA championships, and 10 titles in a 12-year span. In what was, once again, a second-round regional semifinal matchup, Utah State lost 101-79.
In quite the coincidence, Utah State’s next postseason meeting with UCLA, coming in 2001, featured the breaking of two different long-standing marks that dated back to the 1970 tournament. On the positive side, the Aggies didn’t win an NCAA Tournament game between 1970 and 2001 but USU upset Ohio State in the opening round of the ’01 tournament and earned a game against UCLA. On the negative side, the Bruins defeated the Aggies 75-50, which became the new worst margin of defeat by USU in an NCAA Tournament game, surpassing the 1970 loss to UCLA.
For as many times as Utah State has made the NCAA Tournament, it’s not often brought as much experience back from a previous trip to the Big Dance. Three starters from the Aggies’ run in Indianapolis a year ago, and five players overall, are back with this year’s team. Falslev and Martinez headline the group of experienced players, the former having now been on three different teams to appear in the NCAA Tournament.
Utah State basketball guard Mason Falslev speaks with members of the media after the Aggies were picked to be in the 2025 NCAA Tournament
“I’ve been incredibly blessed. This is my third time going to the NCAA tournament. I didn’t play the first time, I was redshirting, but last year it was awesome,” Falslev said. “And even my redshirt year was an awesome opportunity to learn and to just be a part of a moment like that and I’m excited. And I think with every experience like this you get a little bit more comfortable. You get comfortable being on the court, so I’m looking forward to that.”
Utah State ended up as one of four teams from the Mountain West to make the tournament this year, the fourth straight year the conference has had at least four teams in the field. Colorado State, as the auto-bid via winning the conference tournament, got a 12 seed and a matchup with AAC champion Memphis. San Diego State will head to Dayton, Ohio as an 11 seed for a First Four matchup with controversial at-large pick North Carolina. The regular season-winning New Mexico Lobos drew a 10 seed, same as the Aggies, and will face Marquette. Boise State, which was on the bubble, were left out. Calhoun said he believes the conference should have had five teams in.
“I thought Boise State deserved to get in. I thought New Mexico deserved a better seed,” Calhoun said. “Colorado State obviously has a Quad 3 and a Quad 4 loss, but I would not want to play them. They’re playing as good as anybody.”
Several former Aggies who have transferred to other teams made this year’s tournament. Steven Ashworth and his eight-seed Creighton Blue Jays are in the South region. Max Shulga made it with 11-seed VCU and will take on USU’s in-state rival BYU in the East region. And former center Szymon Zapala is currently the starting big for two-seed Michigan State which is in the South region and will play the winner of Marquette/New Mexico.
