Veterans Jaxson Robinson and Noah Waterman led the way Wednesday night as No. 18 BYU rebounded from last Saturday's loss to Utah to beat Denver 90-74 in front of a capacity crowd of 13,349 at the Marriott Center.
But after the Cougars improved to 9-1 by making 12 of 37 3-point attempts, the big questions for head coach Mark Pope centered around a man watching everything from the bench, two-time transfer Marcus Adams Jr.
“There was a great atmosphere tonight, especially after the tough defeat last weekend. I feel like the team played pretty well. I felt like there were a few lapses defensively. “We can definitely improve in a lot of ways, but overall I was very proud of the team.” – BYU guard Jaxson Robinson.
Given a West Virginia judge's ruling Wednesday afternoon that multiple transfers like Adams should be able to play immediately and a temporary restraining order (TRO) was issued to allow a WVU player to take the court for the next 14 days, Adams will be able to do so to take the field for the Cougars soon?
Pope was non-committal, but acknowledged that Adams was “in full action today for the first time all season” as he was unable to even practice much due to a foot injury.
“We’ll see,” Pope said. “We will know more here in the next few days and weeks.”
Previously, Pope admitted that BYU will take it slow and cautious and make sure everything is legit before putting the 6-foot-10 forward from Torrance, Calif., on the court.
“Yeah, so we’re trying to make sure it’s all real. As you can imagine, communication between universities and the NCAA can sometimes be very complicated to get final, final, final information,” Pope said.
“And there are still some nuances of the ruling that we want to ensure. We tend to stay on the conservative side when it comes to security. … Let’s see how fast we can go and then let’s run.”
Next up for the Cougars is Georgia State on Saturday at the Marriott Center.
As for the game against a 6-4 Denver team that pushed nationally-ranked Colorado State to the limit before falling behind by 10 last Saturday at Moby Arena in Fort Collins, BYU showed no ill effects from the loss in Utah and took control from the start.
The Cougars took a 45-25 halftime lead and coasted for the final 20 minutes.
“It was a great atmosphere tonight, especially after the tough loss last weekend,” Robinson said. “I feel like the team played pretty well. I felt like there were a few lapses defensively. We can definitely improve in many ways, but overall I was very proud of the team.”
Robinson scored a career-high 28 points, including 8 of 15 attempts from 3-point range. He became the eighth Cougar in school history to make eight or more three-pointers in a game.
“We kind of went back to who we were in transition and recovery. That’s exactly what we needed against Utah. “It was a tough loss, but we kind of got back to who we are,” Waterman said.
“Jaxs is a dangerous man. Dude is one of the best shooters in the country. Didn't surprise me. He always does that in training, but overall I think it was a great win.”
Waterman, in particular, rebounded well after going 0-for-7 and going scoreless in the 73-69 loss at Utah. The 6-foot-10 senior had his first career double-double — 10 points and 11 rebounds — in the first half alone and finished the game with 22 and 14.
“I just focused on the team. I just wanted to concentrate on defense. I only had four rebounds against Utah, so I was thinking hard about trying to get every rebound,” Waterman said.
“We did well as a team, not just me. Everyone did a really good job on rebounding. That was my attitude.”
The Cougars won the rebounding battle 43-34 and held Denver to 33% shooting in the first half; The Pioneers stepped up, shooting 51% in the second half as BYU's defense faltered.
Denver's Tommy Bruner entered the game as the nation's third-leading scorer with a 24.0 average, but managed just four points on two of 10 shots in the first half.
He finished the game with 15 points, most of them against BYU's reserve team, after being paced by Spencer Johnson and Robinson in the first half.
“We didn’t give Spencer a lot of help and we didn’t give Jaxson a lot of help. We just said, 'You've got to guard him,' and I think those guys did a great job,” Pope said.
“He’s clearly an elite-level scorer. He's really, really talented. I thought the tandem of these guys was incredible tonight, especially in the first half. It was really locked down.”
The Cougars made 24 3-pointers, eight, in the first half and took a big lead at halftime.
Robinson scored 12 points in the first half after entering the game less than 14 minutes. He and Waterman shot 6 of 12 from distance in the first half. The rest of the Cougars were 2 of 12 from 3-point range in the first 20 minutes.
Still, the intensity was nowhere near as intense as Saturday in Utah – for both teams. Both had seven turnovers in the first half after BYU had eight turnovers in the entire game against the Utes.
The Cougars were better able to control the ball in the first 15 minutes of the second half, but then the game got rocky when the subs took over and BYU finished with 12 turnovers.
It was a feel-good night for Utahn Jaxon Brenchley, who led the Pioneers with a career-high 21 points on 8 of 13 shooting. Brenchley prepped at Mountain Crest and Ridgeline high schools in Cache Valley before playing four seasons for Utah.
He had between 50 and 100 fans in the stands, including the entire Ridgeline boys basketball team.
But this night belonged to Robinson, Waterman and the Cougars, who still have three more non-conference games against GSU, Bellarmine and Wyoming before opening Big 12 play on Jan. 6.
“It wasn’t that we weren’t the best in that game against Utah,” Pope said. “There were just brief periods where we felt like we had to do a little bit more than ourselves, and we can actually trust each other because we're pretty good.”