Believe it or not, there was a time in the not-so-distant past when the rivalry between BYU and Utah in basketball was as heated as it currently is in football.
Maybe more so.
Back in the days of Mike Newlin, Danny Vranes, Tom Chambers, Jeff Judkins, Jeff Jonas, Luther "Ticky" Burden and Buster Matheney on the Utah side and Kresimir Cosic, Danny Ainge, Devin Durrant, Fred Roberts, Greg Kite, Alan Taylor and Steve Trumbo on the BYU side — the 1970s, roughly — some of the twice-a-year matchups were as bitter and fierce as any in the country.
As college basketball waned in popularity in the Beehive State in the 1980s due to the arrival of the Utah Jazz in 1979, and other factors, the rivalry cooled a bit, and both programs sagged on the national level.
After enigmatic coach Rick Majerus was hired by Utah in April of 1989, the Utes climbed back into the national picture, while BYU stayed fairly relevant under Roger Reid and then bottomed out in the 1996-97 season, going 1-25 with Reid being fired after seven games .
Before Majerus began coaching against BYU in 1990, BYU had won 13 of 21 matchups with the Utes dating back to a four-game winning streak over its rival in 1979 and 1980.
On Feb. 10, 1990, the Majerus-coached Utes defeated BYU 89-73 at the Huntsman Center, then won the next three matchups, including a 62-61 overtime victory at the WAC tournament in El Paso, Texas.
BYU won eight of the next 10 rivalry basketball games (from 1991 to 1995) after Utah's four-game winning streak, but then the tables turned rather quickly.
Utah defeated BYU 12 straight times between 1995 and 2000, several in lopsided fashion, and the rivalry was mostly dead.
On March 10, 2000, Steve Cleveland coached BYU to a 58-54 win over the Utes in the Mountain West Conference tournament semifinals in Las Vegas, snapping Utah's 12-game stranglehold in the series, and for the next six or so years the rivalry was fairly even, and back again.
In 2007, with coach Dave Rose at the helm, BYU took control of the series, winning 11 of 12 during one stretch. Utah's only breakthrough was a 94-88 overtime win in 2009 at the Huntsman Center.
Of course, midway through that stretch, Utah joined the Pac-12 and BYU joined the West Coast Conference in 2011 — moves that meant the rivals would meet only once a year as non-conference foes.
The rivalry has waned somewhat since, with the instate foes playing non-conference affairs in December, before a lot of fans had turned their attention from college football to college basketball, if they did at all.
Which brings us to this season.
With Utah joining the Big 12, a conference BYU joined in 2023, the Utes and Cougars have been reunited in the same league.
They will play a conference game against one another for the first time since Feb. 12, 2011 — a 72-59 BYU win in Provo — on Saturday (7 p.m., ESPN+) at the Huntsman Center.
The Cougars won seven of the 12 non-conference matchups, and are 16-6 vs. Utah since 2007. However, the schools have split the last 10 contests, with Utah winning the last meeting 73-69 in 2023 in Salt Lake City.
BYU will host Utah on March 8 in Provo.
With the schools back together again in the same basketball conference, now seems like a good time to look back at some of the most memorable rivalry games since 1990, in chronological order:
March 8, 1990: Utah 62, BYU 61 (OT)— With Majerus watching from the stands in his first game back from having heart surgery, the Utes won the first-round WAC tournament game in El Paso, Texas, with two spirited comebacks. Craig Rydalch and Tommy Connor helped seventh-seeded Utah overcome a nine-point deficit to force overtime and a five-point deficit in overtime to down the second-seeded Cougars. Connor, who would later become an Utah assistant coach, drilled a 3-pointer with seven seconds left in overtime to lift the Utes to the improbable win on UTEP's court.
March 9, 1991: BYU 51, Utah 49 (OT)— In a defensive struggle for the WAC tournament championship in Laramie, Wyoming, the rivals' third meeting in three weeks, BYU coach Roger Reid slowed the game down and the Cougars sprung a big upset. Freshman Shawn Bradley scored 21 points and had 13 rebounds and five blocks for BYU. After the game, Majerus said Bradley "will be the best player in the history of the WAC" before his career is over. However, that was the last time Bradley would play against Utah, as he departed on a church mission after the season and entered the NBA draft upon his return from Australia.
Utah came in with a 28-2 record and went on to a 30-4 season while the improbable win earned BYU a spot in the NCAA Tournament in Salt Lake City, where the No. 10-seeded Cougars downed Virginia 61-48 at the Huntsman Center before falling 76-61 to No. 2 seed Arizona in a second-round game.
Feb. 27, 1993: No. 11 Utah 89, No. 23 BYU 83— In one of the most-anticipated BYU-Utah basketball games ever, and with first place in the WAC on the line, Phil Dixon scored 28 points and Josh Grant added 22 rebounds to lead the Utes to the thrilling victory at the sold-out Huntsman Center. BYU led early and the game was tight for almost 30 minutes before Utah opened up a 12-point lead and withstood a late Cougars rally. Gary Trost led BYU with 26 points.
Jan. 8, 1994: BYU 64, Utah 62— True freshman Robbie Reid, son of BYU coach Roger Reid, went 4 of 6 from 3-point range, including the game-winning trey from the top of the key as the shot clock was about to expire with 16 seconds remaining on the game clock, to give the Cougars the win in front of the second-largest crowd to date at the Huntsman Center.
With six seconds remaining, Utah's Craig Rydalch made a driving layup, but was whistled for charging and the basket was wiped away. In his debut against BYU, Utah freshman Keith Van Horn scored 21 points.
March 10, 1994: BYU 96, Utah 65— In a WAC tournament game at the 3-year-old Delta Center in Salt Lake City, the Cougars completed a three-game season sweep of the Utes in resounding fashion as Russell Larson scored 28 points on 12 of 14 shooting. It was the worst loss for a Majerus-coached team at Utah as the Cougars shot 73.9% from the field in the first half, and prompted Majerus to proclaim that Utah "looked like the ski team" after the game at the home of the Utah Jazz.
March 10, 2000: BYU 58, Utah 54— BYU forward Eric Nielsen scored a career-high 17 points, grabbed 11 rebounds and called the win "a dream come true" after the Cougars beat the Utes during the inaugural Mountain West Conference tournament in Las Vegas to snap Utah's 12-game winning streak in the series.
"That wasn't for me," said BYU coach Steve Cleveland. "There's a lot of people in Provo, Utah, that have really struggled with not having the rivalry be competitive. If anything this says it is going to be competitive."
Terrell Lyday added 16 points, then said: "When I go back to school I don't have to listen to everybody on my back saying you can't beat Utah."
Noted Utah star Alex Jensen, who had said before the game that BYU's program wouldn't be considered truly back until it beat the Utes: "They were playing like they haven't beaten their in-state rival for five years."
Jan. 25, 2003: Utah 79, BYU 75— Salt Lake City native Marc Jackson made four free throws in the final 15 seconds en route to 17 points and Utah snapped BYU's 44-game home winning streak at the Marriott Center. With Majerus missing the game to attend the funeral of former Utah star Andre Miller's stepfather, Tim Frost, Nick Jacobson and Britton Johnsen all scored in double figures for the Utes.
Travis Hansen had 21 points and 12 rebounds for BYU, while Rafael Araujo added 19 and nine. Jackson finished 13 of 13 from the free-throw line in a win that gave Utah a 117-116 lead in the series at the time.
Jan. 27, 2009: Utah 94, BYU 88 (OT)— Having lost four straight games to the Cougars, Utah got a measure of revenge in 2009, winning at the Huntsman Center behind Luke Nevill's career-high 32 points. But it wouldn't last — BYU won the next seven games in the series. Utah attempted a whopping 40 free throws in the game, making 31, while the Cougars got just 22 freebies and made 13.
Jan. 11, 2011: BYU 104, Utah 79— For BYU fans, there is not a more memorable BYU-Utah game in Salt Lake City than this one, and not because the Cougars blew out their rivals by 25 points at the Huntsman Center. En route to consensus National Player of the Year status, Jimmer Fredette scored 47 points in the game, the second-best single-game scoring performance in BYU basketball history at the time. The highlight was a near-half court shot to beat the halftime buzzer.
Fredette was 6 of 9 from 3-point range and 9 of 9 from the free-throw line in the rout in what at the time was BYU's largest margin of victory ever over the Utes. "When you are feeling it, you are feeling it," he said.
Dec. 2, 2015: Utah 83, BYU 75— Utah jumped out to a 51-28 halftime lead and withstood a late BYU rally — fueled by Chase Fischer's 26 second-half points — to win its third-straight rivalry game. But the game will be remembered more for what happened with 90 seconds remaining, and Utah firmly in control.
BYU guard Nick Emery sucker-punched Utah's Brandon Taylor and was ejected from the contest. That apparently caused Utes coach Larry Krystkowiak to cancel the 2016 meeting in Provo and buy out the contest for $80,000, an action that earned him the title of "Coach 80K" from BYU fans.
Dec. 8, 2018: BYU 74, Utah 59— In a Beehive Classic game at Vivint Arena in Salt Lake City, BYU forward Yoeli Childs scored 31 points and grabbed 11 rebounds to lead the Cougars to the easy matinee win. But it was a jaw-dropping hammer dunk over two Utah defenders — Novak Topalovic and Both Gath — that highlighted the performance for Childs, who grew up cheering for the Utes and wanting to play for them, but didn't receive a scholarship offer from Krystkowiak.
"A dunk kind of gets your teammates pumped up and gets the crowd into it," Childs said afterwards. That it did.
Dec. 4, 2019: Utah 102, BYU 95 (OT)— Sophomore Timmy Allen scored a career-high 27 points on 12 of 20 shooting and freshman Rylan Jones added a career-high 25 points as Utah overcame a 16-point BYU lead in the second half to pull out the victory in overtime. Utah's comeback spoiled another standout performance from Childs in the rivalry game, as the forward returned from an NCAA-mandated nine-game suspension with 29 points and seven rebounds. However, Childs suffered a hamstring injury midway through the second half and was not on the floor the final nine minutes of regulation. The Utes enjoyed a 31-17 advantage at the free-throw line.
