Post game thoughts

[ironman1315]

TOs were the story of the game. We fix the TO issues and things would be different. We may not have won, but we very well could have. And the worst part is, the TOs were all unforced dumb dumb moments. Fix that and we are fine.

That and the OL. They were terribad in the first half. Shore it up, guys.

Harding needs to go.

[Utesbyfive]

I’ll reserve judgment on Harding until after game 2, but yeah, Rising’s two early turnovers were really where the game turned. Obviously his getting hurt wasn’t great either.

USC is always going to out-athlete us. They obviously did that tonight, and had the benefit of playing two tune-up games versus our zero.

Our defense was better than I thought they’d be, and our offense was hurt by not having Covey.

Question: Does USC just have a more talented D-Line than our rusty, unpracticed O-line? Yes? We may do better going forward, if our games aren’t canceled.

[Trailgoat]

Oline is a continued issue. In defense of the QBs, Utah has a serious WR talent problem against the athletic teams. USC completely shut down the Utah WRs and locked down Kuthie. Defense actually will be solid.

[chinngiskhaan]

There were a few times when Kuithe could have scored if he had just been thrown the ball. Bentley was playing scared all night.

[Utesbyfive]

Agreed. We have all world TEs, but they need help on the outside. Nacua is solid, but Thompson and Enis aren’t the answers. Maybe Costelli can pull some decent WR talent, but that’s a group we have consistently not recruited well on.

[chinngiskhaan]

This is what I don’t understand. If we can recruit guys talented enough to give us the best defensive line in the Pac12 nearly every year, why can we not recruit similar talent on the offensive line? I honestly think our offensive linemen have the raw talent to be far better than they are. They just aren’t coached well.

As far as the receivers go. We simply won’t recruit better there until we have an offense that utilizes them appropriately. Until we have a better offensive line, our QBs will always look mediocre. If our QBs are mediocre, we won’t have productive WR play. If we don’t have that, we can’t recruit better players there. Improve the offensive line, then our receiver recruiting will improve.

Look at Tim Patrick. He’s a starter in the NFL, and he really didn’t do much for us at Utah. He was ok, but he didn’t scream NFL talent. That’s because he wasn’t utilized properly, because our QB wasn’t very good, and that was in part because our offensive line has always been terrible at pass blocking.

[chinngiskhaan]

Agree on all of your points. As bad as that was, it could have been SO MUCH worse. We really aren’t far from being a good team.

I think the most frustrating part of this is that it’s the same damned issues we’ve had for so many years. Questionable play calling on first down, bad QB play that is majorly exacerbated horrific offensive line play.

This team has a ton of potential with Jordan, an awesome group of young defenders, and Costelli coming in next year. I hope Whittingham has the balls to do something about our offensive line coaching. He already let Harding ruin last year. I sure hope for Whitt’s sake that he makes a change there before he lets Harding’s inept coaching ruin another run at a Pac12 title.

Offensive line is NOT a position group that should struggle. If we can get big talented guys to do their job on the defensive line consistently, we should be able to recruit the talent to do the same on the offensive line. I truly don’t think it’s a talent issue. It HAS to be a coaching problem.

I’m willing to give Harding until the end of this season to make these guys look like the best offensive line we’ve had in the Pac12. That is what we were lead to believe we were getting, if I don’t see that by the end of the season, whenever that is. I will not watch another Ute football game until Harding is gone.