Utah Utes Message Board

Washington started at #14 in the AP poll in 2016 😎

obviously this is irrelevant but still

I realize this is about as serious as the preseason rankings, but it something else to discuss.

Sagarin has us at 22nd with an 81.15 value. He has our first opponent at 69.59 and even with the home field advantage bonus that gives us a projected 9+ point win.

Not suggesting you go out and put any M&M on this, but just one more indication that the Cougarboard people may be a tad delusional.

Big 10: 7
SEC: 6
PAC 12: 5
Big 12: 3
ACC : 2
Ind: 1
AAC: 1

Pre-Season rankings don’t mean much, but it’s good to see the PAC-12 being recognized as a deeper conference than previous years. Yes, there aren’t any in the top 10, but having three in the top 15 shows signs of perception improvement. Stanford sneaking in the top 25 is good. I think they’re going to be much better this year and are very possible north champs. Wash St is also going to surprise people, and that game makes me way nervous.

To say the ACC is top-heavy would be an understatement. They have the #1 team, and then Syracuse all the way down at 22. It’s BS the PAC gets singled out as being weak when there’s a conference that gets respect because they have one good team that beats up on everyone else.

The Big 10 gets way too much credit simply because the media loves Ohio State and Michigan. Not sure why a 7-6 Michigan St squad deserves 18, but we’ll see I guess.

I think this is the highest we’ve ever been ranked in the preseason

https://apnews.com/APTop25CollegeFootballPoll

(04 we were #20, 09 we were #19)

To quote the article: “From an outsider’s perspective, the rigidity of the system had athletes solely focused on their own part of the offense and not the cohesive identity of the team as a whole. The result was a relatively unstructured offense early on that failed to maximize its talent, particularly an offense that featured an asset in running back Zack Moss that was underutilized by the pass-heavy scheme.

Utah had its successes, but it was clear midway through the 2018 season the team needed better.”

I see it somewhat differently, mainly because I think the article is an unnecessary backhanded slap at Troy Taylor. After a weak slow start, Utah dropped two games to the Washington programs. Then Taylor’s system produced four straight impressive wins in a row where the Utes scored 40 points or better. In that next game against ASU, Utah’s defense got torched by Manny Wilkens. Huntley, who threw two interceptions, got hurt, out for the season, and Moss was lost for the season later that week. If anything, at that point in the season Moss had been used to exhaustion, while on a few series, I did wonder why he was not being used more. Yet ASU’s coaching staff had very well prepared the Sun Devils for Utah’s aerial show, AND the Utes believed their own national ranking hype.

With Shelley and Shyne, the Utah offense never quite recovered. In that period, Taylor did throw up some wonky desperation plays. In that, his system showed weakness, if not a lack of cohesiveness. However, execution remained an issue, particularly for receivers. We have seen this with other OCs in the prior several years. The season begins okay, Utah gets rocking by mid-season, by the 3rd quarter of the season, teams figure out what Utah is doing and the Utes struggle.

Will it be different this year? I hope so. But that means execution needs to be sharp and continue to improve as the season develops and play calling needs to evolve. The amount of intellectual horsepower evaluating what teams do to limit their strengths is impressive. By mid-season, virtually all teams know what the opponent has, and has schemed a defense to match it. I expect no different this year.

It is only a preseason poll, but much deserved for Leki!

https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/27385539/the-2019-espn-preseason-all-america-team