They streamed in by the caravan from seven hours west, vibrating with hope in their eyes and bass in their throats for a return to Cougar glory. Denver and Ball Arena simply became Utah East on Saturday night.
Few of them, the rows of BYU blue threatening decibels at every bucket or every unfavorable foul, had seen much like this. Not since the days of Jimmer Fredette, the now-Littleton local beaming in the lower basin. Not since alumnus Danny Ainge was helming the Boston Celtics, the NBA lifer sporting a Cougars cap a few rows below Fredette.
“This is a time,” Ainge told The Denver Post, hours before gleeful chants of B-Y-U overtook Ball, “you can’t take for granted.”
If an opening-round win over no. 11 VCU wasn’t convincing enough, a 91-89 shootout win over no. 3 Wisconsin in Saturday’s second-round NCAA Tournament matchup should put the collegiate world on notice: this former Mountain West Cinderella is becoming a Big 12 power. This is the program that plucked former Suns assistant Kevin Young away from Phoenix in April 2024, when Young wasn’t looking much to leave the NBA. This is the program whose big-money NIL boosters just shelled out millions for generational recruit AJ Dybantsa.
This is a program not just built for the future. It’s a program of shooters aplenty and gritty athletes who staved off a Badgers team that kept clawing to the last gasp.
“We’re grateful for the vision that (Kevin) has kind of spread … but we’re ready to win right now,” leading scorer Richie Saunders said Friday.
And win they did, despite the utterly heroic efforts of Wisconsin star and former CSU Ram John Tonje, who made every play for the Badgers down the stretch in a ridiculous 37-point performance. BYU stopped Tonje’s drive on the final play, however, an airball settling into the massive hands of Cougars center Keba Keita as the stands erupted.
By the time a scrapping Richie Saunders cleaned up a layup to put BYU up 38-24 with five minutes left in the first half, Badgers players were left slumping back to their huddle, serenaded by those roars of B-Y-U. This was billed as a shootout, but Wisconsin was largely shooting blanks. Tonje finished the first half 0-4 from deep.
The Badgers were bricking wide-open triples. Smoking wide-open layups. And BYU was simply out-toughing them, carrying a 26-14 rebound advantage in the first half.
Saunders, the golden-haired Tater Tot King, had four offensive rebounds and 12 first-half points. Freshman Egor Demin nailed a triple off a pick amid a back-and-forth with physical Wisconsin guard John Blackwell, bellowing a couple of un-Mormon words in Blackwell’s general direction. And the Cougars were backed at every turn by their traveling troupe of fans.
“Everywhere we go,” Saunders said a couple of days ago, “there’s a lot of blue.”
There was still plenty of red, though, on Saturday. And they got going in the second half behind Tonje, who was wrangled and blitzed throughout the first half but remained utterly expressionless coming out of the break.
“He’s Steady Eddie,” Gard said on Wednesday. “He doesn’t get too high, doesn’t get too low.”
This was his moment, the former Fort Collins hero clawing himself back to the NCAA Tournament after a lost and injury-plagued year at Missouri, and Tonje simply did not stop. Not when his airspace was invaded, pump-faking and back-cutting his way to the rim. Not when a defender hugged against his body, creating sudden room with nifty stepbacks. He broke a three-point seal early in the second half, hitting another flyby triple a few minutes later, drawing a foul on another bomb to chip BYU’s lead down to four.
BYU, temporarily, kept Tonje and Wisconsin at bay thanks to a pair of massive threes from senior guard Trevin Knell, including a walk-up three to give the Cougars a 10-point cushion with 7:33 left. But Tonje kept attacking in a second half for the collegiate basketball ages, burying a ridiculous stepback three to slash BYU’s lead to five with just over a minute left, finishing a raucous and-one layup just seconds later as the Badgers smelled blood.
The Badgers’ comeback came one play short, though, a final Tonje jumper hitting air. And BYU will continue dancing into the Sweet 16.
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