Posted By: Mr. Crimson (High Priest of the Church
of Faith in Utah Football) <me@me.com>
Date: Monday, 22 October 2001, at 12:51 a.m.
First, My nephew is the finest option QB in all the nation. 212 yds rushing 150 yds passing 3 rushing TDs one thru the air and a two point conversion in a 56-7 win as they move to the Wyoming state semifinals. Thanks for letting an uncle be proud.
Now the game.
Did the Wyoming offensive coordinator give Whittingham his playbook and an exact list of what plays would be called in order. I've played and watched alot of football and I don't know how many times I've seen a team throughly dominated the way Wyoming was. I've never seen a team tackle better than Utah did. Our Defense is nothing less than outstanding.
And our offense is very very good as well. Rice made a couple of mistakes but he learned and made some real pinpoint throws. Hunter keeps chuging along and in short there is no real way to stop this offense as you cant take away all things and the theory of crowding the box and forcing teams to throw deep is gone now. I'm glad you're here Mr. Ver Steeg.
In short I like our chances every week from here on out, great D good and still improving O we're going to be very very tough to beat.
Other thoughts, a guy near me in the game said all of these sentences at some point in the game,
"I hate our offense all we do is run up the middle"
"I hate our offense all we do is throw screens"
"I hate our offense all we do is throw short passes"
"I hate our offense all we do is throw bombs"
If we go 10-1 and get into the BCS and then win our bowl game I am certain the Tribune and D-News will lead with a story about our attendence and then will follow it with a story of how BYU is still clearly better than us.
Do BYU fans understand how great a game between 10-0 BYU and 8-1 Utah for all the marbles would be?
Southwestern Wyoming is an amazingly desolate place, and certainly leads the nation in mullets per capita and probably in total number but they are a nice bunch. And they've got a fast food mexican resturant called Taco Johns and better fast food mexican the world has not known.
Thats all for now.
Posted By: Wakara
Date: Saturday, 20 October 2001, at 11:52 p.m.
Great Game against an overmatched team. Overmatched in talent, drive, and yes, coaching. I don't think the offense played great, but they played well enough, and the defense was a thing of beauty. Was Wyoming really one of the country's better offensive teams? If they were, then our defense is one of the country's best, and our games against Oregon and Indiana (bad team, great offense) back that up
The Good:
The Defense, all three units. The Corners kept some very good receivers under check and the D-Line managed to stuff the run and put pressure on the QB by itself. JK will be a pro. Seemed like a slow day for linebackers as the line and the d-backfield did their jobs.
Ver Stegg play calling. While he was too conservative at the beginning, tending to run up the middle on 1st down, by the second qtr we started seeing a good mixing of counters, long ball, hard running, and short passes. Great plan, decent execution. The offense playbook seems to grow each week.
Dameon Hunter. He is a madman this year. He flat out runs through people. Adam Tate didn't get worse, DH is just amazing. If I were an NFL team,I'd snap him up.
Cliff Russell. VS is finding a way to get him the ball, and while he doesn't have Steve Smith's quickness side-to-side, all he needs is one step and he jets like no one I've ever seen.
The OK
The crowd was not as bad as people say. I've heard some complaints, but it really wasn't that bad. The reason it looks bad on TV is that the cameras are on the west side. Afternoon games has the sun shining in the eyes of the east side. I started in the North end zone and moved to the west side along with everyone near me. While the east side looked about 60% full, the west side (shady side) was packed all the way down, and it was pretty loud. I think the TV catch the emptiest part of the stadium. It looked like there were about 35K there, and I didn't hear one anti-LDS comment.
Rice - Actually he was pretty good, but he still floats balls. His long balls finally had enough air under them to let Cliff adjust, and many short passes were catchable, but more often than not, recievers are reaching to catch the ball. I hated that when I played receiver. Much better than the beginning of the season, but not great.
THE Bad
Uhh...Wyoming. Actually, they were overmatched by a motivated club.
Next week is a good test, although I don't CSU is any better than Indiana. Mac has now got 2 good coordinators and it shows. This is the best Ute team since '94, and they have a chance to be better.
The schedule hasn't been hard, but Utah has won every game it was supposed to so far, and that is an improvement.
Posted By: ColoUte - Future Director of Marketing
for the Utes <everutes@hotmail.com>
Date: Monday, 22 October 2001, at 9:07 a.m.
I haven't read any of the post-game thoughts below, so I apologize if I parrot that which others have said. However, after a performance like that, I'm guessing that some of the bigger points could bear repeating.
1. Two words for the defense - OH MY! That was an utter clinic. I think that prior to the 33 yard screen in the Pokes were in single digits in YAC. We got good pressure on the QB, covered their tall, speedy receivers incredibly well, and when they did manage a catch, they were stopped immediately. It was fundamental football at its best, and more evidence that Kyle Wittingham is Head Coach material.
2. That sack in the 3rd by Sione Pouha was a thing of beauty. He blew past his defender. The defender tried to hold him, and didn't even slow him down. He carried his blocker all the way to the QB and threw both of them to the ground. Oh, and he's just a freshman. I was worried about the interior of our line the next couple of years. I'm not any longer.
3. Corey Dodds was only in on 3 special teams plays. S. Gil, I can't see why you're so high on him. I mean there were 10 special teams plays for him. Well, OK, three kicks weren't returned, and two punts went into the endzone, but that still left 5 plays, and Dodds only made the tackle on 3 of them. Where was he on the other two, S. Gil, where was he on the other two? (TIC, of course)
4. This just in, Cliff Russell is fast. On his 47 yard TD, I saw Rice put the ball up and shouted, "What are you doing. The Corner has three steps on...oh, never mind." The only qualm I have with Cliff's performance is that Doug Jolley broke the MWC record for receiving yards with a whopping 20 yards more than Russell had. Maybe if Russell had played more than 2 1/2 quarters, he'd be holding the record right now.
5. Yes, Wyoming isn't a very good team, but they are a good offensive team. They have led the conference in passing up until this game. We held the leading passer in the conference - and a guy in the top 15 nationally - to under 100 yards through the air. I wasn't really sold on our secondary after USF put up 330 on us, but when you think of it, almost half of that was after we were up 52-7. Our secondary is a lot better than I was giving it credit for. There's still room for improvement, but I'm really starting to like what I'm seeing.
6. I was hoping after the Indiana game that we'd be able to drop 30+ on 2 of these last 3 teams. We did it to two of them, and dropped 50+ on the other. That's acceptable, I guess. The sad part is that with BYU leading the nation in offense, no one notices that the Utes are also in the top 20. They really don't like to mention the defensive stats in Utah where, incidentally, the Utes are also in the top 20. Like I said before, we're like Clubber Lang. We're quietly beating the crap out of guys, but with little hype. People will notice soon, though.
7. I'm starting to get a little bugged that we're only getting 4 and 8 votes in the respective polls. It seems to me that being in the top 25 nationally in total offense, scoring offense, and scoring defense, having a RB in the top 15 nationally, outscoring your opponents by an average score of 41-12 over the past 3 games is worthy of a couple more votes. But I'm not really familiar with the idisyncracies involved in voting for a national champ when I never see 90% of the teams. I must be missing something.
8. I know a lot of people want to look ahead to the BYU game, but I think the biggest game of the season is this week. Yes, BYU is probably the best team we'll play, but a win this week makes us bowl eligible, and essentially eliminates CSU. A bowl is critical for this team that returns 33 players from our two deep next year - and the two biggest losses (Russell and Hunter) are essentially replaced with Marty Johnson and Lynzell Jackson. If we continue the improvements we've had each week, we should be, at worst, 8-3, and bowl bound. That's not too shabby for a team coming off a 4-7 season and picked 6th in the conference. But, the best is yet to come. You think we're good this year, I think we could be really special next year.
ColoUte Tip of the Week:
I fell into the BYU obsession trap yesterday. I spent the better part of yesterday pissed off that the Trib gave BYU's defense an A for surrendering a mere 502 yards of offense to Air Force. But, in the middle of church, it hit me. I was so busy being angry about BYU's 4 TD victory that I wasn't able to enjoy our 5 TD victory.
My tip for all of you is to realize that the BYU game is still 4 weeks away. Enjoy what we've got now. This is a damn good football team. It's only getting better. There's a lot that can happen in 4 weeks - injuries, more game film becoming available, Boise State Syndrome, etc. If all you do is worry about the game in Provo, you won't be able to enjoy the games in Ft. Collins, Vegas, and at home against the Aztecs.
The BYU game isn't our season. We can be bowl eligible THIS week, and even if we get waxed by the Zoobs, we can still have our best record since '94. Oh, and that's with 23 Freshmen and Sophomores on our two deep. Like I said earlier, the best is yet to come.
I'm stoked for NWTRU tonight, but not nearly as excited for it as I was last year. It feels good not to need basketball to make me feel good. On the other hand, it's also nice to always have that to fall back on.
In the words of Dennis Miller, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.
GO UTES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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