OREM — After taking a one-sided loss to Abilene Christian last week, Utah Valley returned to UCCU Center in hopes to take down in-state rival Southern Utah.
In the two teams last time playing in Orem as members of the WAC, Utah Valley came out with its own one-sided 89-72 victory to improve to 13-4 on the season and 3-1 in WAC play.
Utah Valley shot over 50% from the floor and 40% from beyond the arc and assisted on 25 of 36 made baskets.
Jackson Holcombe led the Wolverines in scoring yet again with 23 points on 9-of-14 shooting and grabbed nine rebounds paired with five assists in the win.
Holcombe has reached the 20-point mark five times this season, and leads the team in scoring at 16.6 points per contest along with 7.5 rebounds.
"I'm really proud of the guys. I didn't think we shot it great, but we got to the basket and I'm really proud of how they shared the ball," head coach Todd Phillips said.
Utah Valley will take on Utah Tech, who defeated Abilene Christian last week, on Saturday in the return of former Wolverine Ethan Potter.
"I think Potter's a huge part of their team. People talk about the big three we lost but we lost Ethan Potter who was player of the week in the WAC last week. But it gave guys like Jackson (Holcombe) the chance to step up," Phillips said.
His counterpart Tyler Hendricks continued his strong first year at Utah Valley notching his 13th double-figure scoring game of the season with 14 points and grabbing five rebounds. The UCF transfer is averaging 12.7 points a game while shooting better than 50% from beyond the arc this season.
The Wolverines started on an 8-3 run with six of the points coming from Trevan Leonhardt, all in the paint.
Despite holding a 25-17 lead, the Thunderbirds were electric from beyond the arc, hitting five 3-pointers with two coming from former BYU and CSI transfer Tanner Hayhurst.
Utah Valley shooting 57% from the field kept them in the lead, but Southern Utah's 40% from deep kept them in the hunt.
The Wolverines were able to force nine first-half turnovers while committing just five of their own to take a 46-39 lead into the second half.
Utah Valley opened the second half with a 15-6 run with help from two makes from beyond the arc and Southern Utah struggling from the stripe.
The run was capped with a Braden Housley to Isaac Hawkins alley-oop to elevate the Wolverines lead to 67-48.
