Utah
Mountaineers show grit in closing minutes to win at Utah, 71-69 – WV MetroNews
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.
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.”
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.
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.
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.”
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.
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.
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.”
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.
Jon Anderson will be charged with moving the Orem school forward following the death of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk on campus last year.
(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Incoming UVU President Jon Anderson poses for a photo with his family after an event announcing his selection at Utah Valley University in Orem on Friday, July 17, 2026.
BEAVER COUNTY, Utah — A massive community effort is underway as volunteers and Beaver County crews distribute thousands of sandbags to protect homes from the potential path of floodwaters.
After the Cottonwood Fires, residents have been waiting for weeks for relief to come in the form of rain, though officials now warn it may come all at once with an increased risk of flooding and debris flow.
Emergency Service Director Les Whitney believes that the fire has left plenty of debris to bring trouble for residents.
“We got a lot of water. We’re bringing debris with it, so tree branches, tree limbs, logs, lots of different size firewood, and that’s all in the creeks. We’re worried about that plugging up our bridges and stuff, so we have heavy equipment and excavators located in strategic places so that we can keep those bridges open,” said Whitney.
An estimated 140 homes and condominiums were spared from the flames, but remain in the paths of floodwaters.
Residents can also pick up sandbags at the Beaver County Sheriff’s Office or at the Beaver County Rodeo Fairgrounds.
EAGLE MOUNTAIN — An Eagle Mountain man currently on pretrial release in 4th District Court who is accused of abusing his dog has been arrested again for allegedly punching the same animal.
Keith Reaves Davis, 43, was booked into the Utah County Jail on Wednesday for investigation of aggravated cruelty to an animal.
Utah County sheriff’s deputies were called Wednesday afternoon to a grocery store on a report that a man was beating his dog after it had gotten off its leash and was stopped by a bystander, according to a police booking affidavit.
“I reviewed security camera footage from the grocery store, and an individual matching the description of the suspect was seen holding the dog in the air by one paw and repeatedly striking the dog on the right hind leg area. I observed the male strike the dog several times before dropping the dog from approximately 1-2 feet. The strikes appeared to be as hard as the male could hit,” the arresting deputy wrote in the affidavit. “The dog did not cry out or whimper as if the dog was accustomed to the abuse.”
When questioned, Davis “admitted to striking the dog because it was not behaving,” the affidavit states.
An animal control officer who responded to the scene to take custody of the dog noted it was the same dog he had taken from Davis exactly three months earlier during another animal abuse investigation.
In that case, Davis was charged in 4th District Court with aggravated cruelty to an animal, a class A misdemeanor; and public intoxication, a class C misdemeanor, after deputies received a tip from a neighbor that a dog was being abused at Davis’ home, according to charging documents. When questioned, Davis “acknowledged hitting his dog as punishment,” the charges state.
Deputies also reviewed videos that the neighbor had filmed. The neighbor told investigators “there was blood from the dog on the ground of the garage and (the neighbor) can hear the dog screaming as if it’s being hurt. Deputies got the videos from the (neighbor) and you can hear very loudly the dog screaming and crying with a lot of loud banging noises. In one of the videos, you can hear the dog sounding like it is being choked by a collar and is grasping for air,” a police booking affidavit states.
Davis’ next court hearing in the April case is scheduled for July 28.
In their latest booking report, sheriff’s deputies note that they “believe further harm will be inflicted on this dog if it is released back to the male a second time,” and have recommended the dog not be returned to Davis.
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.
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