Utah State’s season comes to close with hard-fought loss to Arizona | Sports

SAN DIEGO — On Sunday, the Utah State Aggies stood as the last bastion of hope for mid-majors and Cinderella’s in this year’s NCAA Tournament. The ninth-seeded squad from Logan planted their feet in front of the Goliath of one-seed Arizona, arguably the best college team in the entire country.

For 40 minutes, Utah State refused to back down. Although they trailed by by eight points less than four minutes into the game, and by as many as 18 in the second half, Aggie Nation watched as their team fought to climb a mountain despite every disadvantage college basketball could throw at them.

But in the end, dreams of glass slippers and “One Shining Moment” faded amid a chorus of “U of A” chants as Arizona fans celebrated their teams 78-66 victory over the upstart Aggies.

“Hats off to Coach Lloyd and the Wildcats. Obviously we didn’t like our seed, whatever it was, a week and a half ago. I think we played certainly better than a 9 seed and didn’t deserve that,” USU head coach Jerrod Calhoun said. “But we didn’t pout. We didn’t sulk. We rolled up our sleeves. We had great prep. And these guys laid it all on the line. Really proud of how hard they’ve played.”

Those first four minutes, where Arizona took a worrying 10-2 advantage over the Aggies, set a tone for the afternoon. In many games featuring one seeds, such a tone-setter could spell disaster and herald an impending blowout.

Not so for Utah State. Calhoun’s squad me the challenge, fought back and made the better team in the matchup prove they were such. The Aggies brought ferocity and toughness to match the top cats and held Arizona to 29% shooting in the first half. The only chink in the armor was giving up 17 free throw attempts.

That didn’t mean a close game at the break, however. Arizona owns not just a top-five offense, but a top-five defense as well. The latter smothered Utah State which itself shot only 37% in the opening half, including 8% (1-for-11) from three. And with the Wildcats getting those extra points on free throws and making four 3-pointers, it meant a 33-24 halftime margin.

“You’ll have some bad shooting nights. We picked a couple of games to not shoot the ball great,” Calhoun said.

A 9-0 run early in the second half presented a similar threat as the first half to the Aggies’ ability to keep the game competitive. And unlike the opening half, that burst rocketed the Wildcats’ lead up to 18 points.

With their backs against the wall, the Aggies brought the fought of their lives.

Over the next seven minutes after going down by 18, Utah State fought, clawed, scrambled and dove for every opportunity to trim that lead down. Defensively, it meant holding Arizona without a made field goal for more than seven minutes (though five made free throws would provide some measure of scoring). Calhoun stayed true to his Saturday press conference words and threw everything he had on defense. Full court presses, switching up defensive coverages and all-out on-ball pressure. It resulted in a few extra fouls (the resulting free throws providing the only offense for the Wildcats in those seven minutes), but it also produced half a dozen turnovers.

“The thing about the game was we didn’t let our inability to score affect our defense the last eight, nine minutes,” Calhoun said. “That’s the maturity. That’s the want-to. That’s your seniors. That’s a team. To battle those guys and play as bad as we did offensively is really just a test to the character of the group and not to give up. And I was really proud of that.”

Utah State’s “inability to score” slowed them down in rallying, but the players were finding ways. Though it required that every bucket be made with a white Arizona jersey in their face or the long arms of Motiejus Krivas inches away from the ball. Drake Allen and Garry Clark brought their best in this regard.

“I thought Garry, in particular, just found a groove. His motor was operating. He’s battling — Garry’s probably 6’7″ — he’s battling a 7’3″ guy. It’s a difficult task,” Calhoun said. “And I thought he just went after every rebound. He set good screens. And he just never gave up. His attitude was unbelievable over the last two weeks.”

Clark led all Aggie scorers with 13 points and had a team-leading six rebounds. Allen added 11 points, including a pair of second-half 3-pointers.

“(Utah State was) a team that had no quite,” Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd said. “Ha no quit and kept coming and they made timely plays and timely shots.”

The fruits of that “no quit” mentality was to cut the lead down to just four points with five minutes to go. Utah State could practically see the next dance in San Jose with only a handful of minutes and a couple more key plays between it a March greatness.

Those key plays would never materialize. For several minutes, the Aggies were perpetually one more big play away. And in due course, Arizona made the run that teams like Arizona are always capable of. With 2:18 to play, Brayden Burries hit a 3-pointer that put Arizona up by nine and shortly after the lead trickled back to double digits. And sight of the Sweet Sixteen, at least for the Aggies, set alongside the San Diego sun.

“Obviously, Burries’ three was a dagger. I thought we guarded that possession really well. It was a six-point game,” Calhoun said. “There’s a lot of plays throughout a 40-minute game that could impact it. And I thought that three by (Burries) was just a big-time shot in a big moment. And that really kind of carried Arizona to the win.”

Utah State’s season concludes as one of the best in recent memory. The 29 wins is the most since the 2010-11 season. The regular season and conference tournament title sweep was the first in the Mountain West era. And the competitive fight against the No. 2 team in the country far exceeded the team’s last attempt at taking on a one seed, which ended with a 39-point loss.

Whatever the offseason holds, the 2025-26 Utah State men’s basketball team upheld and raised the standard of Aggie hoops.

“Proud of our guys. All year long to do some of the things that this group was able to accomplish is not easy,” Calhoun said. “One of the most connected teams I’ve ever been a part of, from our managers to our staff. To our administration, to our players, the most important guys in the program, they truly loved one another, wearing the Aggie uniform, wearing the Utah State uniform truly meant something to these guys.”