It remains to be seen if West Virginia’s 71-69 win at Utah is the final necessary piece to secure a spot in the NCAA Tournament field of 68. A fourth road victory in Big 12 play will allow the Mountaineers to enjoy their cross-country flight on Wednesday at the end of a two-game, six-day road trip.
Mar 4, 2025; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; West Virginia Mountaineers guard Javon Small (7) brings the ball up the court against the Utah Utes during the first half at Jon M. Huntsman Center. Mandatory Credit: Rob Gray-Imagn Images
West Virginia (18-12, 9-10 Big 12) erased an eight-point deficit early in the second half and they secured the game with a 7-0 run in the final minutes.
“That was a fun ending again,” said WVU head coach Darian DeVries on the WVU postgame radio broadcast.
“We came out and we didn’t have much that first 15 minutes. I don’t know what the factors are, long road trip, whatever it may be. But what I was really proud of the guys about is that they bounced out of it. They started to find it a little bit and then they started to play with that confidence and swagger we love to see.”
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Utah needed less than nine minutes of game time to build a 12-point lead at 19-7. West Virginia nearly erased that deficit with a 10-0 run to pull with a basket at 19-17 with six minutes to play before intermission.
The Mountaineers took their first lead since the opening minutes with a three-pointer from Javon Small with forty seconds left in the half. West Virginia led 30-29 at the break.
In the final minute of the first half, WVU center Eduardo Andre was hit in the face by an elbow while attempting to grab a rebound. He remained on the floor for a few minutes but he returned to the game at the start of the second half with his nose packed with gauze. Andre played the remainder of the half with both nostrils plugged. He scored four points and grabbed three rebounds in 17 minutes on the floor.
With the game tied at 36, Utah regained the advantage with an 8-0 run at the 14-minute mark.
Mar 4, 2025; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; West Virginia Mountaineers center Eduardo Andre passes the ball against the Utah Utes during the first half at Jon M. Huntsman Center. Mandatory Credit: Rob Gray-Imagn Images
With four minutes remaining and the game tied at 58, West Virginia scored on three consecutive possessions. A three-pointer by Small gave WVU a lead they would not relinquish. Andre followed with a dunk on the next trip down court and a triple from Joseph Yesufu gave the Mountaineers a five-point lead at 66-61 with two minutes to play.
The Utes (16-14, 8-11) scored three consecutive points to pull within a basket. However, Small hit a well-contested runner in the lane to double the Mountaineer advantage to four points with 36 seconds to play.
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Trailing by six points [70-64] with four seconds left, Utah’s Gabe Madsen hit a three-pointer to pull the Utes within three. Utah stole the inbounds pass and Jake Whalin’s layup trimmed the deficit to one point with 1.7 seconds left. Sencire Harris made one of two free throws to extend the lead to two points. Yesufu partially blocked at half court heave at the buzzer to preserve the victory.
“I thought in the second half, we really dug in and had some big stops as that half wore on. Offensively, I thought we started to find a little more rhythm in how to go get in the paint and make plays for one another.
“Those seniors made huge plays for us. The urgency they played with — whether it was Joe, Eduardo playing with four cotton things in, Toby [Okani] made some big plays.”
Mar 4, 2025; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; West Virginia Mountaineers head coach Darian DeVries looks on against the Utah Utes during the second half at Jon M. Huntsman Center. Mandatory Credit: Rob Gray-Imagn Images
Small led West Virginia with 18 points on 7-of-14 shooting from the floor. He also dished out a team-best seven assists.
“He has carried us all year. He has been terrific. We have asked a lot of him at both ends of the floor. He has to be a scorer and a playmaker for everybody else. And he has to be a defender. He has really rose in big moments for us and tonight was no different.”
Yesufu and Amani Hansberry each scored a dozen points and Jonathan Powell added ten points.
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With the win, West Virginia now has six Quad 1 victories in the NCAA NET ratings, an important metric for determining the NCAA Tournament field in 12 days,
“We’ve got a lot on the line for this game and they knew that. It would be easy if you just don’t have it and you are not playing well to give into it. I thought they did a really good job of just staying together in the huddles and continuing to fight and continuing to find ways to make those little plays. It was a huge win for us. There’s no way to diminish what this was for our season right now.”
West Virginia made 14 of 28 shots from the floor in the second half and they went 9 of 11 from the charity stripe.
Mar 4, 2025; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; Utah Utes guard head coach Josh Eilert looks on against the West Virginia Mountaineers during the first half at Jon M. Huntsman Center. Mandatory Credit: Rob Gray-Imagn Images
Utah owned a 40-31 advantage in rebounds and they attempted 32 free throws compared to WVU’s 16. The lead changed hands ten times in the seesaw contest. Madsen led the Utes with 23 points.
Utah was led by longtime WVU assistant coach and former interim head coach Josh Eilert. He was in his third game as Utah’s interim head coach following the dismissal of Craig Smith last week.
“I want to give a lot of credit to Josh,” DeVries said. “The way he has his team ready in a tough situation and they were competing and fighting and they are well-coached right now. He’s doing a really good job in a tough spot. He is one of those good guys in this profession. Tonight, I told him it was a tough loss and I feel bad for him in that regard. But he’s got this team competing right to the end.”
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West Virginia returns home to cap their regular season with their sold-out Senior Day matchup against UCF (15-14, 6-12 Big 12) Saturday. Tip time at the Coliseum is set for 5 p.m.
SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — A wrongful death lawsuit filed in Utah alleges a counterfeit airbag turned a routine crash into a fatal explosion that killed a teenage driver within minutes.
Alexia De La Rosa graduated from Hunter High School in May of 2025. On July 30, 2025, she was involved in a crash.
The lawsuit alleges that when the vehicle’s driver-side airbag deployed, it detonated and sent metal and plastic shrapnel into the cabin.
MORE | Crashes
A large, jagged piece of metal struck Alexia in the chest, and she died minutes later, according to the complaint.
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The lawsuit, filed by Morgan & Morgan in Utah’s Third Judicial District Court, was brought on behalf of Tessie De La Rosa, as personal representative of the estate of her 17-year-old daughter.
The defendants are AutoSavvy Holdings Inc., AutoSavvy Dealerships LLC, and AutoSavvy Management Company LLC.
Morgan & Morgan alleges that the Hyundai Sonata had previously been declared a total loss after a 2023 crash and issued a salvage title. The suit claims AutoSavvy later purchased the vehicle and had it repaired — during which counterfeit, non-compliant, and defective airbag components were allegedly installed — before reselling it to the De La Rosa family.
The complaint further alleges that AutoSavvy knew or should have known the vehicle contained counterfeit and nonfunctional airbag components when it was sold.
“This is the third wrongful death lawsuit we have filed involving alleged counterfeit airbags that we believe turned survivable crashes into fatal incidents,” Morgan & Morgan founder John Morgan said in a statement. “No life should be cut short because a corporation puts profits above safety.”
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Attorney Andrew Parker Felix, who is leading the case, said the firm is committed to uncovering how allegedly illegal airbag inflators enter the stream of commerce and are installed in vehicles sold to consumers.
“To make this perfectly clear, these are not supposed to be in the United States at all,” Felix said. “They are not approved for use in any vehicle that’s being driven in the United States.”
“They don’t have approval from any governmental agency to be installed in vehicles that are driven within the United States and regulated here,” he added.
Morgan & Morgan says it is investigating at least three additional deaths involving other defendants and alleged counterfeit airbags.
KUTV 2News reached out to AutoSavvy multiple times by email and phone. We were told a member of the company’s legal team would be in touch, but as of publication we have not received a response.
Randall will be among several key visitors in attendance for a meeting on March 6
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) University of Utah President Taylor Randall speaks on campus during an event on Feb. 7.
University of Utah President Taylor Randall is scheduled to meet with President Donald Trump this week.
Randall is expected to be among several attendees at a White House roundtable meeting on Friday to discuss solutions for the rapidly evolving landscape of college athletics with the president, a U. spokesperson said.
The meeting could be postponed, however, due to the war in Iran. As of Monday, “the odds of it happening this week are 50-50 at best,” according to Yahoo Sports.
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If the roundtable happens as scheduled, the guest list includes several current and former notable figures in sports, including NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, golf legend Tiger Woods and former Alabama head coach Nick Saban.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox confirmed in a social media post on X that he would be in attendance as well.
“Thank you [President Donald Trump] for inviting me to participate, and for your commitment to addressing challenges in college sports,” Cox said on X. “[Taylor Randall] is a great university leader who will work with us on solutions for this critical issue.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) University of Utah President Taylor Randall speaks on campus on Feb. 7.
Earlier this year, Randall was called on by the federal House Committee on Education and Workforce to schedule a briefing to discuss the school’s planned private-equity partnership with Otro Capital, according to a report from Sportico.
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The Utes announced their proposal in December of last year, which is a first-of-its-kind agreement between a university’s athletic department and a private equity company.
Utah’s deal with Otro has yet to be finalized. In a Feb. 10 interview with The Salt Lake Tribune, Randall said the university is “still just working through all of the issues systematically.”
“We want to do this in the right way to set both of us up for future success,” he added.
The move is expected to infuse hundreds of millions of dollars into the U.’s athletic department to help sustain the financial future of the program with rising deficits across the industry.
“I don’t think any of us would prefer to be in this situation right now,” Randall said in a faculty senate meeting in January. “But it just is what we’re facing.”
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SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — The 2025-2026 winter season isn’t quite over, but it’s no secret that it’s been a rough one when it comes to snow. Right now, statewide snowpack numbers are hovering around 60% of the median.
But you don’t have to know those numbers to understand what a strange winter it’s been.
“It’s kind of good,” said Carrie Stewart, who lives in Salt Lake City. “I mean, I like it because I like a milder climate. But I realize this summer is going to be hard.”
MORE | Snowpack
“I’m not sad I’m not shoveling,” said Sally Humphreys of Salt Lake City. “But it’s definitely worrying.”
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State water officials are also worried. The clock is ticking to bulk up those snowpack numbers.
“We’re running out of time to get the snowpack that we need,” said Jordan Clayton, supervisor of the Utah Snow Survey. “We have about 40 or so days until our typical snowpack peak.”
There is still some time to make up lost ground, but the odds aren’t great. Clayton estimates a 10% chance of reaching normal by the end of the season.
“Those are terrible odds,” he said.
In fact, the odds of having a record low snowpack are greater, sitting at 20%. It’s a grim reality that has officials looking toward the summer anxiously.
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“I would expect to see watering restrictions outdoors for a lot of places,” said Laura Haskell, Utah’s drought coordinator.
It’s unknown what the next few weeks will bring, but if Haskell had to guess, she doesn’t see state reservoirs filling up much from where they are now.
“In the spring when that runoff hits, we do get a noticeable peak in our reservoir storage,” Haskell said. “The water just starts coming in. But this year, we don’t anticipate getting that.”
Haskell says we have enough reservoir storage to likely make it through the summer, but there are other implications to worry about.
Our autumn season was pretty wet. That led to decent soil moisture levels, which can then lead to higher vegetation growth.
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“If we then have a snowpack that melts out really early, we’ll have a longer than normal summer, if you will, with forage growth that might dry out, and so that’s kind of a bad recipe for promoting fire hazard,” Clayton said.
Utahns have dealt with low snowpack levels in the past. Many Utahns are familiar with their lawn turning brown because of water restrictions.
“We’ll probably just let it go that nice, sandy, golden color that it gets in the summer in a dry climate,” said Dea Ann Kate, who lives in Cottonwood Heights.
As we wait to see what the next few weeks bring, people like Carrie Stewart are just reflecting on an unusual winter.
“It is worrying,” she said. “We need snow. We’ve only shoveled once this season, and that’s very unusual.”
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Water officials are now hoping for something else unusual: climbing out of the snowpack hole that’s been created.
“But there are no times going back where the snowpack totals for the state were close to where they are right now, and we ended up actually at a normal peak,” Clayton said. “So while it’s possible, it’s very unlikely.”
