Utah women push unbeaten Arizona State to limit before 1-point loss

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah women's basketball was seconds away from being the story of the story of the start to Big 12 play by handing Arizona State its first loss of the 2025-26 season.

McKinna Brackens had other ideas, though.

Brackens poured in a career-high 31 points and seven rebounds to help Arizona State hold off Utah 69-68 to improve to 15-0 to start the season Wednesday afternoon at the Huntsman Center.

Marley Washenitz and Gabby Elliott each scored 10 for the Sun Devils.

One year after finishing 10-22 with just three wins in Big 12 play, Arizona State is off to the best start in program history under first-year head coach Molly Miller.

All on a day when Elliott, who averages a team-high 16.3 points per game for the Sun Devils, shot 4-of-8 from the field and 0-for-2 from deep while playing just 17 minutes due to foul trouble.

But Elliott — whom her coach describes as "a gamer" — was on the court in the final minute of a single-possession game, even ASU's other double-digit scorer took over in raising her 14.7-point average.

"She's our other prolific scorer on the court," Miller said of Brackens, "and when Gabby was in foul trouble, you have other people like Brackens stepping up. Marley also hit a huge three at the end when they weren't falling for her, and that's just her mentality. It's a short-term memory, next-play mentality and Gabby's one that has that, too, even when she's in foul trouble. There's nothing you can do about it, it's uncontrollable so just go play hard."

Maty Wilke had 17 points, five rebounds and four assists for the Utes (10-4, 1-1 Big 12), who had a chance to win in a game neither team led by more than 7 points.

Wilke banged in her third 3-pointer of the night with just over a minute to play to tie the game at 64-64, then found Chyra Evans with a runner through traffic to put the Utes up, 66-64 with 33 seconds left.

"I'm extremely proud of our team and our fight, from start to finish," Utah coach Gavin Peterson said. "It wasn't perfect — but we were focused, we were intentional, and we played with an intensity for the longest duration. All of these are things that we want to continue to build off of.

"I'm extremely proud of the fight that we showed," he added. "Credit to ASU; they came in here and they closed out the game … The Big 12 is going to be that type of season, where I think on any given night, anybody can win at home or on the road. It's going to go down to the wire in a lot of these games."

Washenitz hit an open 3 with 27 seconds remaining to put the Sun Devils back in front. That left plenty of time for LA Sneed, who drew contact under the basket with 3.9 seconds remaining and drained the ensuing free throws to give the Utes a 68-67 lead.

But Brackens drew contact herself, calmly sank a pair of freebies herself, and the Sun Devils held on to keep the 15-game season-opening win streak intact.

Lani White added 12 points, four rebounds and a blocked shot for the Utes, and Sneed finished with 11 points, four assists and three rebounds for a Utah team that held Arizona State to 41% shooting and just 4-of-14 from the 3-point line.

But the Sun Devils shot 17-of-20 from the free-throw line — none bigger than the pair Brackens hit just before the buzzer, and Chyra Evans' 3-point attempt at the horn was off target.

"I just really want to win and to play as hard as I can for my teammates," said Wilke, who shot 7-of-11 from the field and 3-of-5 from deep in her most points since Nov. 21. "I've been banged up, so I had to figure out ways to score and I've been getting more to the basket.

"Luckily, I trusted my teammates a lot to pick up the scoring, and that's exactly what they've done. That's exactly what they did. I'm just really grateful to be a part of this program where I can trust in my teammates if I'm not having the best scoring day to kind of lift me up in that aspect."

Avery Hjelmstad finished with 10 points and three assists for the Utes.

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