Jay has covered sports in Utah for more than 30 years and has been writing for the Deseret News since 2019.
Utah bounced back from Thursday’s disappointing home loss to Stanford with a 61-46 win over the visiting Cal Bears Sunday at the Huntsman Center.
Utah improved to 16-9 overall, 9-5 in the Pac-12 with the victory. Cal, the league’s last-place team, dropped to 3-20 and 2-10.
Here are 3 keys to Utah’s easy win over California:
• Seldom-used senior Jaxon Brenchley came off the bench when Utah was struggling offensively in the first half and scored eight points in 14 minutes of action. He finished with a season-high 10 points on 4 of 9 shooting in 26 minutes. Brenchley had appeared in only 11 games before Sunday and had scored only four points all season.
• Kuany Kuany scored nine first-half points and Cal took an early 18-11 lead to cause a stir in the meager Sunday afternoon crowd in Salt Lake City. But Utah made some defensive adjustments on the 6-foot-9 forward from Australia and he scored just two points the rest of the way.
• Having buried the Bears 58-43 in Berkeley on Dec. 29, Utah completed the season sweep with a similar defensive effort Sunday as Cal shot 34% from the field after a hot start.