When the work was done, and Utah held a 20-point lead with the clock draining down, head coach Lynne Roberts took out the player who had propelled the scintillating effort into existence.
Alissa Pili, owner of 37 points in the Utes’ dismantling of the No. 6 team in the country, jogged off the floor. Roberts met her with an arm-swinging high-five and a long hug.
What they said at that moment Roberts would say was “censored.”
But everyone could feel the emotions behind it.
After coming up short against ranked teams like Stanford, South Carolina and Colorado, after losing one of their top playmakers for the year, after looking perplexed for most of the last month, Utah finally broke through. And in doing so, the Utes may have recalibrated a season that was on the verge of being lost.
The scoreboard read 78-58 Utah over USC. The defending Pac-12 champions weren’t dead.
“This was going to be a big weekend for us,” Pili said. “So for us to play the way we did and beat the No. 6 team by 20, it was just a great feeling. We are in the moment.
“... We were obviously frustrated with the way things were going.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Utah Utes guard Issy Palmer (1) drives on USC Trojans guard Kayla Padilla (45) as Utah hosts USC, NCAA basketball in Salt Lake City on Friday, Jan. 19, 2024.
It was hard not to see this weekend — where the No. 20 Utes would play No. 6 USC and No. 5 UCLA — as a referendum on the season.
Utah came into the year wanting to make a Final Four run. But when star guard Gianna Kneepkens went out with a broken foot in December, it looked like that dream was done.
Utah lost a series of games against top-25 teams. The offense that used to be No. 1 in the country looked uncharacteristically vulnerable. Even in wins, like the one at Arizona State, Utah only scored 58 points and Roberts quietly sounded the alarm that this wasn’t the brand of basketball her program played.
But did Utah have the pieces anymore to do it? Players like Maty Wilke were playing out of position. Guard Ines Vieira was playing 40 minutes a night in the wake of injuries. There were no real playmakers outside of Pili.
But on Friday, Utah played its best game of the season against USC.
With guard Issy Palmer back in the rotation, the offense that was so potent clicked back into gear. Wilke was able to go back to the wing. She had a season-high 12 points and looked like the catch-and-shoot weapon Utah needed this offseason.
Roberts used a deeper bench as seven players scored and nine saw significant minutes.
Pili went 13-of-16 from the field and hit five threes, it only ballooned Utah’s lead to 21 points. Something that made Pili remark, “Why not blowout teams by 40 and 20 like we just did?”
It was the most Utah scored against a ranked opponent since February of last year.
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Utah Utes forward Alissa Pili (35) defended by USC Trojans guard Roxane Makolo (30) as Utah hosts USC, NCAA basketball in Salt Lake City on Friday, Jan. 19, 2024.
“Everyone is settled in their roles,” Roberts said. “... We had lost a lot of close games to ranked teams. I think we were sick of coming up short. We talked about that before Cal and even tonight. Let’s not let things that are out of our control matter in the outcome. I’m proud of our team for not pouting.”
On defense, Utah followed the strategy of letting USC freshman JuJu Watkins get her 26 points and limiting everyone else.
“We weren’t going to settle for anything other than a win,” Roberts said. “Sell out, play as hard as you can.”
In the stands, Utah was giving out signs that read “Run it Back” in bold, white letters. Before the game, it was tough to see a path for that.
But a performance like Friday gives Utah hope the team that won the Pac-12 last year is still somewhere inside it.
Utah is still 3-3 in conference and has a long way to go. No. 5 UCLA will be an even tougher task Monday. But Utah needed a top-25 win.
Now, the Utes finally have a heartbeat.
