Next: Spring Game – Sat 4/13 11am – Pac12 TV
Is anyone else concerned with Phillips inability to reach the endzone with his kickoffs?
Not until we lose… It’s a little concerning, but until it matters I think we have to let him do his thing.
I still like PHillips as our field goal kicker, it just seems like we should have someone that can kick the ball into the endzone.
I will be fine up until its reported he is supposed to be kicking it out of the endzone and has not been able for whatever reason (injury/psychology/etc.)
He has displayed ample leg strength in preceding years, so I’m not sure if this is a Morgan Scalley design to try and stop the returns before the 25 yd line, or if its a mistake by Philips.
Explain to me especially with the altitude in slc, why Phillips can’t or shouldn’t be kicking it out of the endzone.
Couldn’t agree more with this topic and its concern. Phillips seems to be like a Jeremy Olsen type? Lack of focus? Idk. But I sure am frustrated if its a coaching thing but because that usu kick to the 40 was bad.
I know at one point Whitt mentioned the shorter kickoffs were by design. The idea is to get good hang time and drop the ball inside the 5. Usually when this is executed perfectly (including good tackling) they are able to tackle the kick returner before he reaches the 25. Not sure if that’s what happening right now, but it has been explained in the past.
I know that two years ago, Phillips didn’t have the leg strength to get it to the end zone. Last year after working out in the off-season, he was able to boot it out of the end zone. I am wondering if he left off on some of the strength training this off-season, and isn’t able to do it any longer.
I just think that his kicks look more similar to two years ago, than last year.
I hope it’s not a strength issue as I get the impression Andy is a pretty hard worker. You could be right though…perhaps he got too confident in his abilities after all the praise he’s been getting and took it easy over the offseason. I trust the coaches to get it worked out one way or another.
The line not posted yet I believe but prediction is Oregon by 14.
Whitt’s Press Conference.
http://espn700sports.com/espn700-interviews/kyle-whittingham-press-conference-9-21-15/
Mark Helfrich’s Sunday Conference.
What defines a good defense, Utah look ahead. Utah discussion from 5:18. D scheme discussion from 8:20.
Can we make it possible to copy the embed code and paste into message body?
http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/utah/sports/m-footbl/auto_pdf/2015-16/release/release_20150921aaa.pdf
You’ll have to scroll to page 12.
At first glance the only thing I noticed was that Boobie Hobbs is no longer in the 2 deep at nickel.
i think Domo starting is new to this week too
I watched the MSU game and wasn’t too impressed with him. I’m hoping our D can get after him a bit. We have been kind of passive the first three games. He seemed to get rattled when MSU blitzed.
Royce Freeman is a beast. I am nervous about him.
I hope we can finally get Oregon this year, but my head is saying we lose this one.
What do you guy think?
I actually like Utah’s chances. I think we will see more stunts and blitzes off the edges to get to Adams. I think if we loosen up the 8 man box we’ll see Booker can have a big day and get tons of yards. Oregon has some tackling problems it looks like.
Yeah, I want to hope for a win, but it just doesn’t seem likely.
First conference game, on the road, at Oregon and our play in the last game was a bit sloppy. We need to tighten it up big to have a chance.
Good. There will be no excuses.
He broke the index finger on his throwing hand. That has to adversely affect his passing.
I don’t think it really matters who starts a QB for Oregon. This is setting up for a great opportunity to knock off Oregon.
He broke the index finger on his throwing hand. That has to adversely affect his passing.
That’s how I see it. It’s like last year when I would rather see Taylor Kelly against ASU when he was coming back from injury and wasn’t 100%. That was a game we could have easily won.
My gut feeling tells me we are going to win this one. We will have to play better than we have so far and will probably need a long return or two to help us out. I’ll say 31-28
Edit: What the hell. Make it 38-28
So are Defense will be scoring 21 pts ?
If we can get pressure on Adams like MSU did, then I could see us getting some INTs and fumbles that could lead to some defensive scores.
Both teams have had sub-par play the last few weeks, with Oregon’s concerns coming on Defense and Utah’s on Offense (mostly).
If Utah’s front 7 can control the line of scrimmage, force the ball out of Freeman’s hands and make Adams have to throw, I really like our chances. I feel our Offense with TWilson back will have enough success that we can keep control of the clock and keep Oregon off the field.
Coach Whitt will do his best to turn this into a heavyweight brawl, hoping to wear down Oregon and make them play our game, just like Stanford used to when they had their success against the Ducks. It all comes down to how well our Line play is on both sides of the ball.
[Insert obligatory #ThrowGame reference here]
We will need to be able to move the ball and dominate time of possession. TW will need to be given a longer leash to throw down field and make the offense 2-dimensional and prevent Oregon from stacking the box on Booker.
I don’t think TW lack of downfield throws is necessarily a ‘length of the leash’ thing, but more a product of him taking the easy throw. I really wish he hadn’t of been hurt, because I thought he was doing some great things in the USU game, and the Fresno St. game would have looked a lot different with his ability to get the ball to the right place on time.
Our screen game will be active, but I think we have been setting up some great misdirections off those looks. I also think our OLine is finally getting into a groove and should be able to do some good things – but we’ll have to watch out for Buckner and the rest of Oregon’s front 7.
Our playaction is going to drive opposing Defenses crazy for the rest of the year – Booker is too good to not respect in the run game that we will be able to dupe linebackers and safeties into biting on fakes. Covey has been making hay with quick passes so we’ll get nickelbacks and strong safeties biting on the low routes too. It just depends on whether we can have some additional success stretching the field. We just have to keep defenses honest and our run game will do the work.
I don’t think we’ll ever develop a big passing game with our current coaching staff and the type of players they recruit.
However, I don’t think we need to have that type of game to consistently compete in this conference.
A passing game between 5-20 yards that is effective enough to keep teams from stacking the box is all we need to give our run game the room it needs to be effective.
I have a hard time being optimistic against teams who can score as much as Oregon. Our defense is good, but it’s a lot to ask to keep Oregon (even without Mariotta) under 30. And it is really damn hard for the Utes to score more than 30.
I hope, but I doubt.
Jake said: I hope, but I doubt.
This is my sentiment as well. I can’t shake that doubt, but I think that comes with being a Ute fan – we’re (mostly) a pessimistic bunch. Maybe has something to do with the cosmos demanding we counter the overbearing optimism from down south, but who knows.
But, I will say, we have more of a chance this year than we did last year, and we had quite a good thing going leading up to the infamous drop.
Our screen game will be active, but I think we have been setting up some great misdirections off those looks. I also think our OLine is finally getting into a groove and should be able to do some good things – but we’ll have to watch out for Buckner and the rest of Oregon’s front 7.
Our WR screen game has been really non-productive because 1) our receivers have been poor blockers and 2) defenses have made just about every one-on-on (and Peppers with some one-on-two) tackle. A few misses tackles from Oregon DBs who have struggled mightily with tackling, and our WR screen game starts rolling. WR screen game starts rolling and defenses cheat. Defenses cheat and the long ball is open.
I believe Utah has been very vanilla on both offense and defense thus far (At least that’s what I tell myself to help me sleep at night). No disrespect to our OOC opponents, but I think Utah could get away with not exposing any exotic blitz packages or special weapons on offense. I’m really hoping the Oregon game will be their coming out party.
I think Adams will be affected by his finger throwing the ball so I expect to see a heavy dose of Rolls Royce Freeman. I think the D-Line and LBs will be up to the challenge against the run, hopefully the secondary will be alert enough to pick off some errant passes. Oregon is going to get their yards and points (I would guess 30-40 range) so the offense is going to have to score. Lucky for Utah Oregon has not looked particularly good on that side of the ball.
My heart tells me Utah will get this thing done, my head tells me Oregon is just too powerful on offense. Either way, I think it’s going to be very close (spread is way too much in favor of Oregon FWIW). Ah hell, I’ll go ahead and say 38-34 Utes pull off the upset!
I can’t help but wonder if the vanilla look is intentional or if that’s just who we really are… i would imagine that the defense would have the personnel to at least do SOME blitzing, but the offense, i suspect, is going to be exactly what we’ve seen so far
I felt Travis really started to get it together and then he got hurt. I’m hoping to see more improvements from him if he’s healthy.
Utes will improve as they have always had those “rise to the occasion” moments. They tend to play up (or down) to their level of competition at times. They have got to get a passing game going though to allow Booker room in the box. Utah by 5!
I would love to see a Utah victory. But I am not going to hold my breathe. I am an old fart who remembers too many games back in the 8os before Utah was even close to being good. Learned not to get your hopes up.
That being said, I do believe Coach Peace has something special drawn up for this game to get after Adams. Rattle him in conjunction with a broken finger and something good might happen.
That being said, I do believe Coach Peace has something special drawn up for this game to get after Adams. Rattle him in conjunction with a broken finger and something good might happen.
Would love to see that. Increased and consistent pressure on the QB would be a nice improvement.
I believe we have put plenty of pressure on the opposing QB (I can think of three INTs that came as a result of hurried throws) but we’ll put even more when Pease starts calling in more stunts and attach blitzes as well. I think we can confuse the snot out of Adams who can’t throw with as much velocity with that broken finger of his.
Someone speculated before that maybe the defense(read Pease) was holding back something on defense by playing vanilla for when we start play in conference.
I usually don’t listen to that type of talk since that is usually what people say about our offense and then nothing every changes. However, it does seem odd that a team that registered so many sacks last year has had difficulty getting sacks.
Here’s to hoping that Pease has something up his sleeve to dial up some pressure on Adams. Not exactly the best time to put more blitzes into the scheme though, as Adams will make the defense pay with his legs if their over pursue.
The two things I would like to see:
1) More sacks from the defense
2) More consistency from the passing game & more explosive down field plays.
Autzen Stadium is supposed to be the loudest, toughest place to play in the league. That’s one major concern I have about this one. The Utes need to be nearly flawless to come out with a win, but I’m afraid there will be several miscues that end up being too costly, caused in part by crowd noise, etc. I’d feel much better about it if it were in Rice-Eccles.
Then again, two of our best wins last year were at the Rose Bowl and at Stanford Stadium — so we have shown a decent ability to win on the road.
I went to the oregon game that terrance cain started and it was loud and their fans were dicks.
Boise State fans. Just farther west… So I’ve been told.
Talking to dave fox today, he says kW thinks Davis will be starting but it doesn’t really matter who the qb is, that running back will give the Utes a lot of trouble. Again, not my words.
vernon adams, not davis.
While Oregon’s defense looks somewhat suspect, they still seem to be able to score a lot… which well we don’t seem to be able to score a lot :/
^^^^THIS^^^^. To have a shot at beating Oregon you have to score points, because eventually their speed wears down any defense.
Utah has shown they can score on Oregon’s defense in the past, but we seem to make big mistakes at the worst times.
It’s gonna take a clean and full-60-minute effort to have a chance.
I never count out our Utes!
Hopefully our D-Line depth will help keep the defense fresh. We also have some pretty decent depth at corner.
Defensive depth is definitely something we have. However, experience is a bit in short supply at the corner position.
If we can maintain assignment integrity and avoid getting beat deep I like our changes.
Here’s my own test post.
Testing, testing…
Seems to be working!
And this is my test post
With conference play starting up, it might be fun to have a weekly prediction contest for all the conference games.
Also, is there any way to expand the topic title beyond 80 characters? I’m a firm believer in putting as much content into the topic as possible.
Not sure about the character thing.
Polls are pretty easy to setup. Just swimming in new user registration issues right now!
/s Serious? two-days in and you can’t handle the flood of new users?
But for realsies, it is a testament to the status of the online Ute community that this site has taken off like it has. Yes, twitter can fill the void somewhat, but you can’t have sustained indepth discussions like you can on a message board.
Speaking of twitter – you should see if you can implement some integrated ‘share’ function for good posts/threads…you know, once you dig yourself out from the pile of new user requests.
No worries, thanks for the response. Your priorities are in the right place
The drums at the end of the 3rd quarter are a great idea, but we have got to do something to improve the audio or engage the fans.
Agreed. That first game “whatever” they did was terrible…better this time, but still lacking in volume for what it is they are trying to present.
I don’t know it would even be allowed but, It would be really cool if the fans had noisemakers to follow the beat and it was double time.
I am confused by the Japanese drum show. I wish we would do something that fired up the team for the 4th quarter – at their best the drums never did that imo
Blow up the drums. I hate the drums.
We just need to get rid of the drums. The out-of-sync slow clap does nothing to build energy. The cannon is the only redeeming feature. Whenever the drums roll out, I hear numerous people complaining about it.
I still say we should give the third quarter break over to the Ute tribe, and allow them to use it to promote their tribe, and pump up the crowd. Last year they did a “good luck” dance, which was cool, and which most seemed to like.
Now mic’ing the band… that is something I could get behind.
Haha the “Out-of-synce slow clap” is the worst! Whatever we do it needs to be LOUD. Granted, I’m up near the top but, I can barely here the drums. Someone commission the Jazz Bear.
What we need is the blast Europe’s The Final Countdown over the speakers while launching a few fireworks then blasting the 4 cannons.
That being said, our stadium speakers aren’t that good.
Milton always bringing a smile to my face.
I would take this over the drums any day… assuming we could hear the speakers.
The stadium PA is horrible. I imagine that it is similar to the sound whales would hear if you played 80’s rock underwater with the treble cranked to 11.
That said, I thought I heard that the video board and the PA were scheduled for upgrade next year. Does anyone know if that’s true?
I like the tribal part of the drums, but the crowd clapping off is horrid. Maybe a few more big ones would be cool.
It needs to go away. Total energy suck and I think it does more harm than good.
The Michigan version was a disaster, the Utah State version was a lot better.
I’m not sure what the best answer is, because it is not my area of expertise. But the good news is that whoever is in charge of this seems to have also figured this out. The reason the whole thing sounded better against Utah State is that they included actual drummers from the band in the presentation.
I’m hoping that this means they are actually conferring with musicians who know how to play and create a presentation that can excite a crowd. Hopefully this will lead to further improvement in the whole drum thing. I will say that I have been to a college drum line competition and that was really cool and exciting. If they can generate that kind of excitement into this, then I could see it finally becoming a success.
They tested the “Michigan Version” at Fan Fest and it was a disaster. I’m glad they got rid of it after one game. It seems the athletic dept. is getting better at seeking and implementing feedback.
Looks like the site timers got mixed up and now have some posts looking like they are from the future.
The site was set to a different time zone, other than mountain standard. I changed it so for a few hours a few posts will be wonky on their time. It will work out in a few hours.
Figured it was something like that – I’ve tried posting to the ones that still register as in the future, but my posts were just embedded into the middle of the threads instead of at the end.
Oh well. Like you said, just a few hours and it will be fixed.
Predict the 2019 Utah Football regular season record
Total Voters: 89
Loading ...
