USU hopes tweaks during bye week lead to first conference win


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LOGAN — There are times in the college football season when the bye week comes at the best time. For the Utah State Aggies, who were coming off a 31-24 loss to Colorado State, the respite from competition came at just the right time.

For the first time in seven years, USU is 0-3 in conference play. Losses to Air Force and Boise State followed by the Colorado State debacle have the Aggies in danger of not becoming bowl eligible for the first time in six years. The Aggies have lost the three conference games by a combined 25 points.

"So, just because you didn’t finish a couple drives in a couple games and you’re a touchdown loss in two games and you’re a 10-point loss in the other game, is there some changes that can be made? Wells said during his Monday press conference. "Yeah. But they’re tweaks, I don’t think they’re wholesale changes. I’d be up in the night for a coach to do that right now at this point in the season unless there were major, major issues and unless somebody wants to prove that or ask that to me, they’re losses. But you can’t just change, we’re not going to go all of a sudden to two back, or go empty all day or go to the triple like I was just teasing. We’ve got to be careful of changes when you say changes, because changes entail we’re all of a sudden going to go to double-eagle package on defense or 4-3 Tampa two tee. That’s not happening."

Wells knows that fans want to see more from the Aggies and knows that there will always be critics. However, he also knows that USU is close and just needs to make the little changes that will put them over the top.

“Fans want changes," Wells said. "Oh really? I mean, they want to win. Well, there isn’t a bigger fan of Utah State football than Matt Wells. And I want to win, too. So, whether it’s changes in the bye week when we go back and look at tweaks or more things we do better, less things we don’t do as well, we’ve done this in this situation quite a bit, so play off of it, that’s what self-scouts are for. So, we’ve always tried to do that, try to get healthy and practice a few things and get the young players some work and recruit. That’s what bye week’s about.”

One player that Wells has relied on all season and hopes to continue to build around is quarterback Kent Myers. The junior leader rushed for 92 yards and two touchdowns as well as threw for 205 yards against Colorado State. One thing Wells worked on this week with Myers was completing passes down the field.

"In terms of analyzing Kent’s game, he’s been very stingy with the ball, he’s made good decisions," Wells said. "We can improve our deep ball throwing, we worked on that a little bit last week. Hopefully, we can throw and catch them a little bit better, which is not just him, it’s releases at the line of scrimmage, it’s protection when throws are open down the field and having better protection and it’s him throwing on rhythm and on time and more air, less air, those kind of things."

However, going into a late Saturday night matchup at home against Fresno State, Wells also knows that it's not just on the shoulders of Myers. It's on the shoulders of the entire team to pick up its first conference win of the season.

"That’s the biggest thing that I would like to see improved in terms of that. But, when you look at it as a broad picture, ‘What can we do to score more points?’ It’s more involved than Kent.”


Kyle McDonald is sports fan who loves the Chicago Cubs and the Utah Valley University Wolverines. He is a communication major at UVU and will graduate in the spring of 2017. Follow him on Twitter at @kylesportsbias

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