Utah Basketball: Quick Idaho St. Thoughts and an Idaho St. Basketball Story

First, sorry we missed you yesterday, we’ve had some network wide server issues, but our fine tech folks seem to have resolved them so, HOWDY.

My thought from Idaho St. plus the win over Willamette and the loss to Sac St. is this.  As Jordan Loveridge goes so goes this team.  If Jordan is scoring, the Utes aren’t horrible, but when he’s not this team is really bad.  Don’t forget we beat Idaho St. last year.  I’m sure Ute fans are hoping that Aaron Dotson helps things, but remember he averaged 7PPG at LSU and had the green light.

The other thing is Dallin Bachinsky continues to surprise.  Stumbling ass backwards into this kid is probably this staffs greatest recruiting coup.

But now for something completely different.

THE STORY OF THE GREATEST MOMENT IN IDAHO ST. BASKETBALL HISTORY.

The year was 1977 and UCLA had been to the final four the year before and every year for about a decade.  And Idaho St. was Idaho St.  The scene was the Marriott Center in Provo, Utah.  This was a battle to go to the Sweet 16 which everyone assumed UCLA would win.  UCLA led the first half in a closer than expected game.  But what happened at halftime would change the game FOREVER.

The halftime entertainment was either the BYU dance team or some dance group from BYU, they have about 138 dance groups.  UCLA comes out of the locker room early, while the performance is still going on.  They essentially disrupt and cause the performance to end early as they started to warm up.

Well HELL HATH NO FURY like BYU fans when their dance group has been scorned.  Suddenly UCLA finds itself in a game where 22,000 very angry Cougar fans have started chanting IDAHO STATE – IDAHO STATE.

Idaho St. goes on to win the game 76-75.

People called it the biggest upset in college hoops history at the time.  Gene Bartow, Wooden’s successor would leave UCLA after that year and take the startup job at UAB.  UCLA wouldn’t return to the Final Four for nearly 20 years.

Truly one of my favorite college hoops stories.