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Men’s basketball dominated in Utah loss

Jordan Bachynski shoots in traffic against UA on Dec. 31, 2011. Bachynski finished the game with 10 points, seven rebounds and four blocks as the Sun Devils lost to the Utes 64–43 on Saturday. (Photo by Aaron Lavinsky)
Jordan Bachynski shoots in traffic against UA on Dec. 31, 2011. Bachynski finished the game with 10 points, seven rebounds and four blocks as the Sun Devils lost to the Utes 64–43 on Saturday. (Photo by Aaron Lavinsky)

Without its leader, the ASU men’s basketball team was blown out for the second straight game Saturday.

The Sun Devils (6-13, 2-5 Pac-12) lost to Utah 64–43 without junior guard Trent Lockett in arguably the team’s worst loss this season.

ASU struggled offensively without Lockett on the two-game road trip. Similar to its 69–54 loss to Colorado on Thursday, ASU never led in the game against Utah due to another slow start.

“Obviously we miss him, but there’s no excuses,” assistant coach Scott Pera said in a radio interview after the game. “The guys on the court have to play better. They have to perform better. This is an unacceptable performance.”

Utah jumped out to 12-0 start in the first four minutes. The Sun Devils didn’t get on the board until junior guard Chris Colvin made a free throw with 15:43 left in the first half.

“This morning, the guys were ready to go and wanted to win,” Pera said. “To come out and start like that is almost inexplicable.”

The Sun Devils shot 39.5 percent from the floor, shooting just 2-for-12 from 3-point range. Junior guard Carrick Felix had 13 points and five turnovers, but most of his points came in the second half when the game was out of reach. Sophomore forward Kyle Cain had 10 points and six rebounds.

With his family in the stands, sophomore forward Jordan Bachynski posted 10 points, seven rebounds and four blocks.

“Hopefully that’ll help Jordan because confidence in these young guys is an important thing and we need him,” Pera said. “If he can build off a 10-point, seven rebound, four block performance, then good.”

As bad as the Sun Devils were on offense, they were just as awful on defense.

The Utes (5-14, 2-5 Pac-12) dismissed senior point guard Josh “Jiggy” Watkins Wednesday due to violating team rules. He led one of the worst offenses in the Pac-12 with 15.6 points and 4.8 assists per game.

Utah wasn’t hampered by his absence Saturday, shooting 58 percent from the floor. Coming into the game, Utah was ranked 333rd from 3-point range, shooting 28.1 percent.

The Utes shot 9-for-14 from behind the arc.

They had four players in double figures. Junior guard Cedric Martin went 5-of-9 from 3-point range, finishing with 17 points and four assists. Junior guard Chris Hines had 14 points and shot 4-for-6 from 3-point range.

“It’d be one thing if I thought this morning they still had a hangover from Thursday’s game (or) that they hadn’t moved on,” Pera said. “But they had enough focus as a group to know that trying to get a split on a road trip is a good thing. They said the right things. They were sharp.

“They got hit early and we don’t have enough firepower without Trent to come back in a situation down that much.”

ASU will attempt to snap a two-game losing streak at home next week. It will face Washington State on Thursday at Wells Fargo Arena, where the team is 3-7 this season.

“All we can do now is try and protect our home court, which we have not done a good job of doing this year, Pera said. “It’s something we need to do a better job (of) this weekend.”

 

Reach the reporter at mtesfats@asu.edu

 

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