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SALT LAKE CITY -- The 13th ranked Utah football team continues its season Saturday against San Jose State at 6pm on Saturday at Rice-Eccles Stadium. The game will be televised, oh, wait, no, the game won't be televised. Let me say that again, the 13th ranked team in the country will not appear on television this weekend.
Two quick things to remind Ute fans: 1. KSL will be covering the game and will have highlights and post game reaction from the game and 2. In 2011, the Utah Utes will be playing in the PAC-12. The Mtn. television network has chosen the UNLV/New Mexico game instead of the Utes.
Now, on to preview the game that will not be on television this weekend.
Offensively for Utah
There are a couple of question marks that need to be addressed. The first question is who will be playing quarterback. If Jordan Wynn is completely healthy, as he says he is, he is the starter. Utah has been saying that all along, as have the quarterbacks.
Head Coach Kyle Whittingham said on Wednesday that they are not going to "tip their hand" on who will start the game though. The question then becomes, what Utah wants to accomplish, other than winning the game. Jordan Wynn hasn't played a game since September 2nd. When game time arrives, that will be 23 calendar days that Wynn hasn't seen any action. The game after this is on the 9th of October at Iowa State. If he didn't play this Saturday, that would be exactly five weeks since he would have last played in a game. Coach Whittingham might want to get Wynn some meaningful game snaps, maybe even a quarter or two of action to get him up to game speed again. If the Utes struggle with the Spartans, he would play more. Utah could then finish the game with backup quarterback Terrance Cain and possibly even get some more reps for Griff Robles as well.
Defensively for Utah
The obvious strength for this Utah defense is the defensive line and the defense against the run. Utah ranks first in the MWC and 19th in the NCAA against the run. The deep and athletic defensive line has helped the inexperienced linebackers improve and become a tackling force. J.J. Williams is out again this week, but when he returns, a deep Ute defense gets deeper and stronger. The secondary has played well also. Brandon Burton continues to be a blanket on the opposing teams' best receiver. Lamar Chapman is the reigning MWC defensive player of the week. The safeties have also complimented the rest of the defense to create another powerful unit.
Special Teams for Utah
Since the game against Pitt, Shaky Smithson has been nothing short of brilliant retuning punts. He ranks first in the MWC and fourth in the NCAA in punt returns and has won MWC special teams player of the week for weeks two and three of the season. Utah finally had a clean week punting the football against New Mexico after disastrous games against Pitt and UNLV. That will continue to be something to watch as the season moves forward.
Offensively for San Jose State
Statistically for the Spartans it doesn't look good. Going simply off of the rankings, they are ranked 8th in the WAC and 115th in the NCAA in rushing, averaging 67 yards/game. They are ranked 9th in the WAC and 89th in the NCAA in passing offense at 177 yards/game. Their total offense is 9th and 116th in the WAC and NCAA respectively and they are averaging 11.0 points/game (9th in WAC, 118th in NCAA). Their schedule has been extremely difficult though, opening at #1 ranked Alabama and then at #11 Wisconsin. They were rolled in Tuscaloosa, and played Wisconsin pretty well for a half. The Spartans third game is what interests me though. They beat Southern Utah 16-10 and got a touchdown with 70 seconds remaining in the game to get the win.
Defensively for San Jose State
The Spartans are giving up almost 450 yards/game on defense. They give up over 182 yards on the ground and 260 yards through the air. The Utes ought to have a field day up on "The Hill" Saturday evening.
Overall
How good is Utah? After watching Pitt get destroyed at home against #19 Miami Thursday night, I was hoping to get a better picture of how good Utah is. What is the answer? I still have no idea. Pitt obviously isn't as good as their preseason ranking of #15, and with Utah having played nobody, and benefiting from people above them losing every week, who knows? For the time being, the Utes need to take care of business and put up a huge number because hardly anybody will see this game because it is not televised. Hey Mountain, how many people are watching New Mexico vs. UNLV?
