Siale Fakailoatonga suffered an injury last Saturday night. Because of this, there will be more opportunities for other players on offense to step up for the remainder of the season.
When Harrison Handley was given playing time against ASU last weekend, he played up to standards, was always where he needed to be and left the field with confidence. He, along with Ken Hampel, who also made an impact against the Sun Devils, should expect to see more playing time, according to head coach Kyle Whittingham.
“Harrison Handley steps to the forefront — he is the lead tight end now,” Whittingham said. “Ken Hampel is a guy that’s in the mix also — you saw him catch a nice scene route against ASU, had about a 20-25 yard game. He did a nice job blocking as well, which sometimes goes unnoticed.”
Handley has prepared himself for these chances throughout the course of the season by working hard during practice and keeping in mind that an opportunity to play could happen at any given time.
“I just knew that the tight ends were going to start being more utilized in the past games, and I’m glad to see that the word has stuck and everything is going the right way,” Handley said. “All the schools that recruited me recruited me as a tight end. [Utah] saw that I had the ability to put on the weight — I knew I had the ability to put on the weight.”
He was given playing time earlier this season and has learned from those performances. Now, with all the injuries on the team, he’s focused on how he can contribute moving forward.
“Someone needs to step up,” Handley said. “Siale [Fakailaotonga] and Evan [Moeai] were a huge part of the offense, obviously, so I think it’s time for myself and the rest of the tight ends, including Hampel, Wallace [Gonzalez], Caleb [Repp], all the guys to step up and make some plays.”
Handley has been observing his teammates play and is learning how to improve his own game.
“Just learning from them is probably the biggest factor in how I am going to do this season, and step up and help the offense,” Handley said.
Whittingham also thinks that, aside from Hampel and Handley, there is plenty of opportunity for other guys to step up, including Gonzalez and Repp.
“[Gonzalez] is just a freshman, but we think he has a lot of upside,” Whittingham said. “[Repp] is still considered a tight end, even though we don’t do any prototypical ‘tight-end’ things with him, but he’s a guy that’s going to have an increased work load as well due to player departure.”
With his team on an undefeated 6-0 run so far, Handley has been keeping a steady pace and practicing discipline. He thinks the Utes will be able to overcome the injuries on offense and looks forward to playing USC.
“I’m ready for the next opponent. We need to just realize the special opportunity that this team has,” Handley said. “Obviously it’s going to be exciting and it’s hard to put that aside, but as coach Whitt always says — you gotta forget about the last opponent we just played. You gotta move on to the next one, and just prepare that whole entire week to beat them.”
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