Utah basketball: As a mediocre season ends, pressure mounts on third-year coach Craig Smith
The Utes will miss the NCAA Tournament once again while BYU and Utah State are going dancing.
Utah was eliminated from the Pac-12 tournament — and, consequently, the NCAA Tournament — with a double-digit loss to Colorado on Thursday night.
Today, coach Craig Smith slides onto the hot seat.
To be clear: Smith isn’t in danger of getting fired in the next 72 hours, next week or anytime this spring.
But he will enter next season, his fourth in Salt Lake City and Utah’s first in the Big 12, under significant pressure to upgrade the program. To produce the essential next step in its evolution. The step Utah fans had expected this season. The step required of head coaches from coast to coast.
The Utes have improved under Smith’s watch. That’s indisputable. But they haven’t improved enough to keep the heat off Smith’s seat.
Before we examine the source of that heat, let’s recap Utah’s trajectory under the Smith regime — it offers important context.
He took over the program in the spring of 2021, following the pandemic-disrupted season in which the Utes were 12-13 under Larry Krystkowiak and finished eighth in the conference.
Smith’s first year was an immense struggle. With an overhauled but underwhelming roster, the Utes managed just four victories in conference play and 11 overall.
His second year featured a marked upturn as Utah finished 10-10 in the Pac-12 and produced a winning record (17-15) that wasn’t quite good enough for an NCAA Tournament bid.
The Year 2 improvement raised expectations for Smith’s third season — a momentum season for head coaches attempting to revitalize their programs.
With star big man Branden Carlson eschewing the NBA Draft, guard Gabe Madsen returning and Georgia Tech transfer Deivon Smith arriving, the Utes were picked seventh in the Pac-12 race.
That projection seemed a tad low when the Utes won 11 of their first 13, edged Brigham Young and swept the Washington schools to open conference play. As the calendar turned, Utah was well positioned for its first March Madness appearance in eight years.
Then: Trouble.
The Utes floundered on the road, dropped eight of their final 12 in the regular season and claimed the No. 6 seed in the Pac-12 tournament. A barrage of injuries contributed to the uneven performance — of that, there is no doubt.
But after so much preseason optimism and so many early-season wins, the Utes were merely an average team in a mediocre conference.
Granted, that status constituted an improvement over Smith’s first season, but not his second. In fact, the Utes finished with a worse conference record this year (9-11) than they did last year (10-10).
And the optics are even worse.
Why? Because the mediocrity didn’t unfold in a vacuum. On a relative basis, the Utes appear to have regressed.
Down the road, Brigham Young performed admirably in its first season in the rugged Big 12, securing a fifth-place finish and a berth in the NCAA Tournament.
Up the road, a miracle unfolded in Logan as first-year coach Danny Sprinkle completely overhauled Utah State’s roster and produced a first-place finish in the Mountain West — another conference indisputably stronger than the Pac-12. Like BYU, the Aggies are headed to March Madness.
A few states over, another team with a reconfigured lineup, Washington State, leapfrogged the Utes in the Pac-12 race and climbed all the way to second place.
If Utah State and Washington State were able to thrive under dire circumstances, shouldn’t Utah have done the same with a stable roster and a returning all-conference player (Carlson)?
The optics are not good.
Because of the transfer portal, the timeframe used to render judgment on new head coaches has been expedited. Rebuilding projects that once required four or five seasons now need just two or three — and in the case of Utah State, just one.
Smith’s work thus far has been solid, not stellar. Had the Utes won enough to claim an NCAA berth, even with a double-digit seed or spot in the First Four, the pressure would be limited next season.
Instead, they stagnated.
A proud program with a rich basketball tradition in a state that appreciates the sport is once again on the outside looking in when the Madness begins. It has been that way each spring since Krystkowiak reached the second round in March 2016.
Next season, Smith’s fourth season, will be crucial.
No, it will be essential.
If history repeats and elimination from the conference tournament next March also means elimination from the NCAA Tournament, Smith’s job security will be far more murky than it is today.
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