It took everything the Utah Utes could produce Wednesday night to draw bigger cheers than those received by the halftime performers, the Jean's Golden Girls dance team of women from ages 50 to 92.
Luckily, the Utes have their own group of active seniors.
In their own way, center Luke Nevill and the other Ute seniors were just as impressive in a 70-60 win over UNLV at the Huntsman Center.
It's not so much their advanced ages that distinguish these guys, it's how far they've come in this program -- from the two losing seasons that got their original coach fired, to 20 wins and being on the verge of a Mountain West Conference championship two years later.
They haven't clinched anything yet, but this was the victory they needed to make it happen eventually.
Coach Jim Boylen was partly hoping to avoid the subject of the seniors' success in postgame interviews, because it makes him a little misty.
"To me, that's what it's all about: making a memory," said Boylen, mindful of how much he has demanded of them. "It's been a hard thing for these guys."
So the class reunions will be much more fun in the future, although the questions almost became a lot tougher Wednesday. The Utes could have made it much easier on themselves, while seemingly refusing to put away the Rebels in the middle of the second half and almost blowing their 14-point halftime lead. But this effort was good enough in the end.
It was another senior-driven production, especially in a first half when the Utes (20-7, 11-2 MWC) took over the game and built enough cushion to withstand the Rebels' rally.
As they took a 38-24 halftime lead, Nevill and Shaun Green accounted for 22 of the Utes' first 28 points, then Lawrence Borha and Tyler Kepkay helped the seniors score 30 of the team's first 33 points.
Nevill finished with 19 points and 13 rebounds as the four seniors totaled 53 points.
"As a senior, it feels great to leave a winner," Nevill said.
This probably not was the intended script for Utah, but it sure worked. Ray Giacoletti recruited the four seniors, then Boylen turned them into winners, after they had posted a combined 25-34 record as freshmen and sophomores. They obviously could have improved under Giacoletti, but not this much.
Boylen took an underachieving, defenseless group of Utes and made them tough, confident and poised -- traits that nobody would have accused them of possessing, as of only two years ago.
There's some danger in giving Boylen too much credit too soon, with history's reminder that Giacoletti took Rick Majerus' recruits to the Sweet 16 in his first season but could not follow up that performance with anything close to it.
The best that can be said of Giacoletti is he left the next coach with some talent, and Boylen developed it wonderfully. Boylen's recruiting success also shows potential for keeping this thing going.
He's doing it right now with pretty much the same offensive efficiency as in the old days of 2007, paired with dramatically better defense. This was a winnable game for UNLV, but the Rebels could shoot only 34.5 percent from the field while getting as close as 57-55 before Ute junior Luka Drca hit a three-pointer, followed by two free throws.
It was the least younger guys could do, in the interest of helping the seniors move closer to a title that would have seemed unimaginable when they were sophomores.
