Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — The University of Utah welcomed it's newest offensive coordinator Dave Christensen Tuesday.
Christensen, the former head coach at Wyoming, joins the program as its seventh offensive coordinator in seven years.
"We've changed offensive coordinators quite a bit," head coach Kyle Whittingham said at a Tuesday press conference introducing Christensen. "And there's been some things you can't control, you have to replace guys when they leave. But as far as making a change, it was something that we still need to get better.
"We're not trying to bash the people that were there in the past as we go forward, because I think we're on the right track," he added. "But we've got to get better; we're still not getting enough offensively. Our hope is that Dave will help take us to that next level."
And while there has been a lot of turnover on offense, Christensen said he's not coming to the university to make a lot of changes but to improve what's already in place.
"We want to take a lot of the plays we ran here in the past and try to make some small changes to those," Christensen said. "Things certainly weren't broken. We just need to do a little coaching and get better at the little things and continue to make progress from an offensive standpoint.
We would like to push our tempo a little more. We'd like to change the launch point — the pocket — and different areas. But a lot of the stuff, after I've watched the film, is going to be similar to what Utah did last year.
–Dave Christensen
"I don't think it's as drastic of a change as people may think it is," he added. "I don't think it will be an issue whatsoever."
Christensen, a proponent of an up-tempo, spread offense, said the playbook will just need a few adjustments to improve the tempo of how the game is played.
"We would like to push our tempo a little more. We'd like to change the launch point — the pocket — and different areas," he said. "But a lot of the stuff, after I've watched the film, is going to be similar to what Utah did last year."
However, Christensen said the speed of play will be dictated by how well the quarterback fits with the system and how well the offense is moving the ball.
"It's really based upon the execution and scoring points," Christensen said. "If you're executing and scoring points then we'll go as fast as we can possibly play. What you don't want to do is go three-and-out and punt the ball, put our defense on the field, go three-and-out and put the defense on the field. The tempo is what we're really go to stress in spring ball and the higher level of execution the faster we're going to play."
As last year's starting quarterback Travis Wilson continues to be monitored by medical staff, Christensen will be forced to mold an offense around several quarterbacks until a starter is named sometime likely in the fall.
"The ideal (QB) for the system is a guy that makes great decisions with the football, has an accurate arm, has escapability, somewhat of a threat from a running standpoint," Christensen described. "We can do things with the offense based on the skill level of that position."
"The dilemma is Travis' health and not being able to know for several months down the road," Whittingham said. "He's out of the equation in spring ball, as far as I'm concerned as far as our planning. … From my understanding it's 100 percent a medical decision. The family is going to rely on the medical staff."
Christensen said Wilson is still expected to be the starter if he's healthy, but there are several options available if Wilson can't play football again.
"He's (Wilson) very promising as a football player if he's able to play. If he's not, we've got a lot of young guys — Schulz led last year — and we've got two young men that we've redshirted," he said. "It's hard to make permanent decisions until we learn a little bit more about the position and who's going to be playing that position for us."
Coming into spring practices, Christensen said he has two simple priorities: "The No. 1 priority is to protect the football. No. 2 is to get everything installed, get the terminology down and identify our top 22 to 25 players offensively."
