Following Utah’s 42-10 loss to Arizona players struggled to find what exactly went wrong.
The Utes failed to get a first down in the opening quarter of the contest and Utah quarterback Travis Wilson couldn’t find an explanation.
“I don’t really know, can’t really pinpoint anything,” he said. “Obviously its my job to start fast, and I started slow so I definitely take the blame for that.”
For the third straight year against the Wildcats, the Utes allowed over 200 yards rushing. Safety Brian Blechen was in search for the reason why Arizona consistently exploits the Utes.
“I don’t really know what it is,” Blechen said. “Maybe their scheme because they spread us out? They’ve done a good job to exploit a weakness that we have. They come to play against us, scheme or not. Their players did a great job tonight.”
Whittingham offered the best but not the most precise explanation of what happened to Utah.
“Got out coached, got out played, that was pretty apparent,” he said. “We didn’t start off too bad, I don’t think there was an emotional let down at the beginning of the game now at the end I thought there was. I thought for the first time this year we didn’t finish.”
The Utes didn’t finish. Of all the problems that plagued Utah on a rainy Saturday afternoon, the biggest was their inability to finish. The Utes offensive struggles aren’t anything new, and even their rushing defense has been on the decline in the recent weeks.
Arizona marked the third time in the last four games, Utah’s opponent put up over 200 yards rushing. And the one team that didn’t, Stanford, gained 190 yards on the ground.
“Run game we were soft,” Whittingham said. “I just think we got reached on the edge three or four times. We didn’t play (the perimeter run) very well.”
Even with all that had gone wrong, it still felt going into the third quarter that Utah had a chance.
The Utes cut the Wildcats lead to 21-10 in the third quarter and seemed to have the momentum. The Wildcats were playing with a backup quarterback, the Utes offense had started to show some signs of life and it seemed like Utah, just like it had done so many times this year, was going to be in position to pull a game out at the end.
It didn’t happen this time.
A Kaelin Clay punt return touchdown was called back for a hold. Travis Wilson fumbled a snap on third down to not just end a drive but knock his team out of field goal range.
With the mistakes piling up, Arizona took full advantage. Wildcat running back Nick Wilson busted through the Ute defense for a 75-yard touchdown run, and on the next Utah possession Arizona picked of Travis Wilson and quickly scored again to put the game out of reach.
“As bad as we were, the turning point in the game was the punt return that was called back,” Whittingham said. “If we do end up having that one stand, it’s 21-17 and it’s a ball game. But it wasn’t to be, it got called back, we made a mistake on it apparently somewhere and it kind of spiraled out of control form there.”
Utah’s loss to Arizona has made the questions being asked about this Ute team become much more prominent. What really is going on with the offense? Why has the defense given up so many yards on the ground? And most importantly – Can Utah really continue to find ways to win, with such clear and obvious deficiencies?
It was a game that felt like so many others, but with a drastically different outcome.
Utah’s season has been a success any way you look at it, but if they can’t find answers soon that success might be revealed as nothing more than a mirage.
 
[email protected]
@millerjryan