A date with No. 1 South Carolina came as a surprise to the Utes

In the middle of Utah’s run to the Pac-12 women’s basketball title last season, Gavin Petersen received a proposition.

The Basketball Hall of Fame wanted Utah to fill out its annual showcase in December. But they couldn’t tell the Utes who they’d be playing just yet.

Petersen, Utah’s scheduling czar and associate head coach, didn’t mind the mystery. An event like this, he knew, would put Utah on a national stage. UConn regularly played the event. Baylor, Louisville, Villanova and others filtered through. No matter who they paired with, the Utes knew it would be a marquee matchup.

Even so, Petersen was shocked when he found out.

“They finally came back and said, ‘Hey, South Carolina, we really want them to be a part of this event. Do you guys mind playing them? At the time we’re like, ‘You know, what, No.’ What’s better than your perennial Final Four team?” he recounted with a laugh.

Jokes aside, Sunday’s matchup with the No. 1 team in the country is exactly where the No. 11 Utes want to be.

“If [the Final Four] is a place we want to go,” Petersen said, “well let’s get into that type of arena.”

Utah Is among six teams heading to Connecticut for the weekend’s showcase, including UConn, UCLA, North Carolina, Florida State and No. 1 South Carolina.

It sets up an early test for Utah to prove it belongs among the game’s elite this year. And it unexpectedly produced Utah’s first meeting with a No. 1 team since 2021.

“They’ve been established,” Petersen said. “That’s something we admire, and we want our program to get to that level at some point.”

Scheduling challenges

Right now, though, Utah is still adjusting to being mentioned along with South Carolina and UConn.

And the Utes are finding life near the top isn’t always easy.

Outside of events like this one, Utah ran into roadblocks putting together this season’s schedule, Petersen said. Typically, he has his work done on the schedule by June. This year, with a top-five preseason ranking, Petersen couldn’t find teams who wanted to come play Utah.

Good teams that would produce Quadrant 1 and 2 games — a factor the NCAA selection committee considers come tournament time — didn’t want to risk losing.

And when Petersen went another route, such as pre-season tournaments, those fell apart too. Utah was supposed to play in the Women’s NIT in the nonconference this year. It would have been two home games and a road game.

But the WNIT called in July and said it wouldn’t be able to fulfill its obligations. It gave Utah a road game at Baylor, a Quad 1 game. It also gave Utah a home game against South Carolina State. But the third game disappeared.

Utah had to scramble and play a buy game with Carroll College, a nondivision one team. It also had to add a game against Saint Joseph’s in Philadelphia.

The Utes won that game easily, 74-48, on Thursday. But in years past, that would have been a guaranteed game in Salt Lake City, Petersen said. This time, it had to be a home-and-home.

“If you are a mid-major team, high mid-major team, and you want to come play us here in the Huntsman, it’s got to make sense,” Petersen said. “So it’s either there’s a price tag associated with it. They have somebody on their team that they want to get close to home, or to start a home-and-home and they feel that they can give us a good run.

“So if any of those three categories aren’t met, chances are they don’t want to come here and play us which is fine. It just makes our job a little harder.”

At this point, it has led to a nonconference schedule that is lighter in terms of Quad 1 and 2 games. Baylor will be one of them. South Carolina will be another. But other than that, the schedule is filled with Quad 3 and 4 matchups.

For now, that is fine because the Pac-12 is arguably the best women’s basketball conference in the country. Utah can get away with playing a weaker nonconference and still have a strength of schedule worthy of an NCAA Tournament bid.

But when Utah moves to the Big 12, where it is not as strong of a conference, that could be an issue. The Utes want to compete for No. 1 seeds and strength of schedule matters.

“Changing conferences, it’s going to be a little different in that regard,” Petersen said. “The last couple of seasons, we play so many Quadrant 1 and Quadrant 2 games in conference, that you don’t want to overschedule in the preseason. Heading into the Big 12, I can gather, it’s going to be a little bit of the same. Maybe not as many Quadrant 1 games, that’s to be determined. And that’s our job to kind of figure out our best guesstimate to that overall picture.”

For next year, Petersen is still looking for more opponents like Baylor — Quad 1 games that don’t hurt a program if you lose that early in the season.

But he knows the formula might include more events like the Basketball Hall of Fame. He indicated Utah has one lined up for next year and it will be announced soon. It might be the way for the future for a highly ranked team.

For now, though, Petersen and the Utes are going to enjoy the spotlight and Sunday’s marquee matchup with South Carolina.