By Jay Zwahlen
Utah (14-6, 7-0) dealt the BYU women''s basketball team (15-5, 6-1) its first loss in Mountain West Conference play on Saturday afternoon, Jan. 27, 2007, in the Huntsman Center in Salt Lake City.
Both the Utes and the Cougars were undefeated in league play coming into the game, but Utah''s balance between pressure defense and solid free-throw shooting at the end of the game gave them the edge in their 64-54 victory.
The first half was a scoring duel between BYU center Dani Wright and Utah guard Morgan Warburton.
Even though she was double-teamed the entire first half, Wright nearly put up a double-double with 14 points and eight rebounds. Warburton had 15 first-half points, her usual average for an entire game.
'Warburton played a really nice game tonight. She came out with the attitude that she was going to score it,' BYU coach Jeff Judkins said. 'Even if she would have gone 3-20, she still would have kept shooting it.'
Warburton made three first-half 3-pointers from well beyond the arc, stretching out the BYU defense.
Wright did most of her damage in the post, shooting a stellar 6-9 from the field.
'We just wanted to earn her points, and I thought she did,' Utah coach Elaine Elliott said. 'She had a great game. We made a lot of mistakes on her, but she makes that happen. She''s so big, strong and mobile.'
The Cougar guards were ice-cold in the first half, shooting just 15 percent from the field. Guard Mallary Gillespie was shut down by the pressure defense from Utah guard Heidi Carlsen.
Utah led 28-24 at the half.
The numbness from the cold-shooting first half by the Cougars continued into the second half.
BYU managed to score just six points in the first 10 minutes of the second half, allowing the Utes to take a 12-point lead.
But with 4:06 to go in the game, Gillespie hit a 3-pointer to close the gap to just six points. That was as close as the Cougars would get the rest of the way.
Warburton hit four straight free throws and a layup with less than a minute left in the game to seal the Ute victory. She finished the game with a game-high 25 points.
'I just kept telling myself to pull the trigger,' Warburton said. 'If I''m open, I''m going to pull the trigger. It was falling for me so I just kept running with it. I was just feeling it. When you come out and a couple of shots fall, you just want to keep pulling the trigger even more.'
Wright''s 21 points and 10 rebounds led the Cougars. It was her third double-double of the season. Lauren Riley added eight rebounds.
Judkins met with his team for 30 minutes after the game to discuss where they will go from here.
'I wanted to make sure the team realized that sometimes when you lose a game it''s hard to lose, but you just need to learn from it,' Judkins said. 'I wanted to make them realize what we need to do better, so that when we play these guys next time, we''ll be able to do a better job.'
The sluggish effort from the Cougars could be attributed to the fact that they were traveling all day Friday from playing at San Diego State.
'People don''t realize that we played Thursday night in San Diego. Our plane got delayed to get here,' Judkins said. 'She (Elliott) had a whole week to prepare for us. Next game against Utah, we''ll have a little more time to prepare some things.'
The Cougars beat the Aztecs 54-49.
Wright and Gillespie led the Cougars in San Diego with 12 and 10 points, respectively. Lauren Riley had a team-high 10 rebounds.