61 in P5 conferences (if I counted correctly). Only 10 of those got to play in their conference championship. Only 5 won.
In other words, Utah finished in the top 16%.
We all know what could’ve been and IMHO what should’ve been. But to sit here and endlessly complain about one aspect of what our coaching staff responsabilities is unrealistic and unfair let alone ignorant and naieve. 115 other teams would have killed to be in the spot we were in.
I know people hate this, but Utah will never be a recruiting hot bed. There is a strong stigma outside the state and to overcome that is incredibly difficult especially when dealing with atheletes of minority races. If you deny this, you are not living in reality. For example, I met a couple this summer in SLC from Madagascar. Their first question what where they should go to see the mormons (thinking they all lived on a ranch some where). They had no idea that most mormons are just normal everyday folks just living their lives. Could you imagine growing up in LA and getting a call from Scally to invite you to play here, where in your mind we don’t have sex, nor drink and all have 5 wives under that age of 16? This is, in reality, what some think when they think of Utah.
We all want more. While I believe every coach eventually get’s to a plateu in their tenure, I think this year proved that Whit is not there yet. Letting go of the most sucessfull coach in school history, or even advocating such either directly or indirectly, is assenine. It would likely significanly set back the program decades.
Our recruting improves every year. The main reason for that is our consistency. The same staff. This staff used players of similar back grounds to show recruits that they can be normal here and that it is a good place. It’s working and will continue to improve. But it will never reach the level that some ‘fans’ would like it to. Plain and simple.
On a side note, coaching didn’t lose those last two games though the offensive play calling could have been better. I will never call players out (by name), but what I saw in the last two games was players trying too hard to make big things happen when smaller opportunities were there that would have led to larger ones, had they been taken advantage of. IOW’s, instead of doing their 1\11th as they had one most the year, a lot of players were trying to do more. Frustrating, but understandable.
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