Utah holds off late charge by Washington in opener

LAS VEGAS — Timmy Allen led six Utah players in double figures with 24 points and 11 rebounds, and the Utes had to hold off Washington’s late charge for a 9895 win in the opening round of the Pac-12 Conference tournament on Wednesday.

Allen and the Utes (12-12) jumped to a 17-point lead early, led by 12 at halftime and never let Washington cut the deficit to single digits until late in the second half.

Jamal Bey hit a three for Washington to pull within 90-81 with 2:06 left, but Alfonso Plummer answered with the 14th three-pointer for Utah to push the lead back to 12.

The Huskies (5-21) pulled to 95-88 with 48 seconds left on two free throws by Quade Green. After a missed free throw, Washington’s Cole Bajema appeared to have an open dunk to pull within five, but Ian Martinez blocked the dunk from behind and free throws by Mikael Jantunen pushed the lead back to nine.

A layup by Erik Stevenson and three-pointer by Bajema with less than a second left led to the final margin.

Plummer finished with 21 points, including six threepointers. The Utes shot 54% from behind the arc.

Green led Washington with a career-high 31 points in likely his final game with the Huskies.

The loss concluded one of the worst seasons in school history for Washington. The .192 winning percentage for Washington was the worst since 1993-94 when the Huskies went 5-22.

Arizona State 64, Washington State 59: Alonzo Verge Jr. scored on a challenged drive in the lane with 11 seconds left, lifting Arizona State in its openinground game. Verge finished with a season-high 26 points as the Sun Devils (11-13) closed the game on a 10-2 run for their second win over Washington State in less than two weeks. Arizona State beat Washington State 77-74 on Feb. 27 in Tempe. The No. 8 seed Sun Devils face No. 1 seed Oregon in the quarterfinals on Thursday.

California 76, Stanford 58: Matt Bradley scored 19 points and had six rebounds and six assists to lead California over Stanford in a first-round game. Oscar de Silva led Stanford with 12 points and five rebounds. The No. 11 seed Bears will face No. 3 seed Colorado on Thursday.