Butler and Utah will meet Monday afternoon in the opening game of the inaugural College Basketball Crown – a single-elimination, 16-team tournament in Las Vegas; the event is founded by AEG and FOX Sports. The Bulldogs have not played since March 13 when they fell to top seed St. John's in the quarterfinals of the BIG EAST Tournament.
 
Butler (14-19) vs. Utah (16-16)
College Basketball Crown Round of 16
Monday, March 31 • 12PM PT
MGM Grand Garden Arena • Las Vegas
 
TV: FS1 • Tim Brando, Donny Marshall & Nick Bahe
Butler Basketball Live (Audio) with @MarkMinner & Nick Gardner (@n_gardner): Varsity Network App & TuneIn
 
• In KenPom rankings through the games of March 27, Butler ranks 75th, which is one spot ahead of Utah (76).
• Butler is shooting 36.6 percent from three-point range on the season, which is good for 49th nationally; on the other end of the court, the Bulldogs defend the three-point line well, allowing opponents to hit only 31.3 percent of their attempt from behind the arc (which is 56th nationally).
• Butler ranks tenth in the country, committing only 13.5 fouls per game. The Bulldogs' three most recent opponents have combined to attempt only 13 total free throws.
• Jahmyl Telfort earned All-BIG EAST Third Team honors, as announced by the conference prior to the league tournament. Telfort is among the BIG EAST leaders in a number of categories: scoring average (ninth), assists (11th), field goal percentage (seventh), free throw percentage (seventh), and minutes played (fourth).
• The Bulldogs opened the BIG EAST Tournament with a 75-69 win over Providence March 12; Pierre Brooks II led the Bulldogs with 25 points; his 11 made field goals set a career-high and tied the season-high for a Butler player. Brooks has nine 20-point games on the season.
• Patrick McCaffery went 4-for-7 from three-point range in the BIG EAST quarterfinal loss to St. John's. He is shooting 41.5 percent from behind the arc this season. McCaffery has hit multiple three-pointers in 21 games this season.
• Andre Screen ranks eighth in the BIG EAST at 1.33 blocks per game; his 5.9 rebounds per game are 13th in the conference.
• Butler is 9-0 this season when scoring 80 or more points, including all six of their BIG EAST wins.
• Butler has shot at least 50 percent from the field in each of its six BIG EAST wins.
• Butler limited Providence to 38-percent shooting in the March 12 BIG EAST Tournament win; Butler's defense also accounted for a season-high 10 steals as the Friars committed 13 turnovers, which tied the season-high for a Butler opponent.
• Butler committed only one turnover in the regular season finale at Creighton March 8. Villanova also had only a single turnover in their Dec. 21 game at Creighton. Prior to the two occurrences this season, the last BIG EAST team to have only one turnover in a game was Louisville, which had one turnover Feb. 7, 2007 against Georgetown (Rick Pitino was the coach of that Louisville team).
• Butler is averaging only 8.0 turnovers per game over the last seven contests (despite two of those games being against St. John's and their defense that ranks 12th nationally in turnovers forced).
• Telfort has scored 529 points this season, putting him just outside the Top 25 in Butler program history for points scored in a single season (535 points ranks 25th).
• Brooks and Telfort are in their respective second seasons at Butler; in 66 games played for Butler, both players have registered 988 career points.
• Telfort went over 2,000 career points in the Feb. 26 game against St. John's. Telfort currently has 2,083 career points and is 15th in career scoring among active players who have spent their entire collegiate careers at Division I schools. 
• The Bulldogs defeated Northwestern and No. 25 Mississippi State in taking the Arizona Tip-Off title over Thanksgiving.
 
What Happened in Vegas...
• Butler has played in two events in Las Vegas previously: the 2016 Continental Tire Las Vegas Invitational and the 2021 Maui Invitational (which was played in Las Vegas that year due to the COVID-19 pandemic).
• Butler won the 2016 Las Vegas Invitational, posting wins over Vanderbilt and Arizona; the Bulldogs then immediately traveled to Salt Lake City from Vegas for a game against Utah that started a home-and-home series.
 
An Update on Utah
• The Utes are 16-16 on the season and finished 8-12 in Big 12 play. They are led by interim coach Josh Eilert, but have hired alum and current Dallas Mavericks assistant coach Alex Jensen to lead the program moving forward.
• Utah has 11 players who average at least 9.6 minutes per game and no Ute averages 30 minutes per game.
• Gabe Madsen is the team's leading scorer at 15.1 points per game. He has attempted 300 three-pointers this season (in 32 games); that is currently seventh in the nation.
• The team's average of 17.5 assists per game is sixth nationally; Utah pulls down 39.8 rebounds per game, which is 14th in the country.
 
The Series with the Utes
• The two teams first played during the 1964-65 season, which is Utah's only win in the four previous match-ups.
• Butler's three wins have come in the 2010 Diamond Head Classic in Hawaii as well as a home-and-home series Nov. 28, 2016 (in Utah) and Dec. 5, 2017 (at Hinkle).
 
Series: Butler Leads, 3-1
Streak: Butler, W3
At Neutral Site: Butler, 1-0
First Meeting: 1964-65 Season; Utah, 95-66 (at Utah)
Last Meeting: Dec. 5, 2017; Butler, 81-69 (at BU)