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SALT LAKE CITY — It’s one of those games Utah would like to erase from its memory, but the thought remains like a bad taste in the mouth. And head coach Kyle Whittingham isn’t ready for any of his offensive staff to forget about it.
“The message with no uncertain terms is: we’ve got to get a lot better on offense if we’re going to have a chance to win many more games this year,” he told ESPN 700 following the game. “That wasn’t good enough.”
Utah managed 354 yards of total offense but only came away with 7 points from the offensive staff in a 17-6 win over host Northern Illinois. A Matt Gay 40-yard field goal and a late-game pick-six by linebacker Chase Hansen made up the rest of the difference in the rough outing for Utah on the road.
For Whittingham, it all starts up front for the offense. The offensive line allowed Northern Illinois to push them around all night and made it so quarterback Tyler Huntley had little time to develop a formidable offense. Huntley was sacked six times and the offense as a whole allowed 14 tackles for loss.
“It all starts up front,” Whittingham said. “If you don’t play well up front — as the offensive line goes, so goes the offense.”
The offensive line features four returning starters from last season’s unit and should have the right chemistry and drive to get after a so-called lesser opponent. The line had a porous start to the 2017 season, too, but offered Huntley enough protection by the end of the season, leaving reason to believe the line would start better in 2018. But Saturday night, the line was knocked off their blocks and were on the losing end of a strong defensive push by Northern Illinois.
“We got pushed around up front, which doesn’t usually happen to us,” Whittingham added. “But we did get pushed around with our offensive line.”
In seven of Utah’s 13 drives — that’s 53.8 percent — the drive ended as a result of at least one tackle for loss or a sack. In one such instance where Utah found itself on Northern Illinois’ 29-yard line, Huntley was sacked for 9 yards on second down and then sacked an additional 7 yards on third down. Utah was once again forced to punt.
Two of the most egregious plays are as follows:
- TJ Green dropped an easy pass up the seam on second down at Northern Illinois’ 24-yard line late in the second quarter. The run could have gone for probably 10 yards, setting up the Utes in great territory to finally score. Huntley was sacked on the ensuing play and Gay missed a 43-yard field goal.
- Siaosi Mariner dropped a 6-yard pass on third-and-six at Northern Illinois’ 21-yard line. The pass was one he normally makes and would have extended the drive to a potential touchdown. Utah settled for a 40-yard field goal, but a touchdown late in the game would have been at least a boost to the offense’s confidence. “That wasn’t good enough. We couldn’t finish drives. It’s a huge disappointment,” Whittingham vented to Bill Riley. “Coming into the season, I thought we had a lot going for us, a lot of weapons. But to put on that display tonight was disappointing. “We had a lot of drops on the outside, and we can’t — you can’t drop the ball at this level,” he added. “We cannot have drops, at least certainly not the amount of drops that we’ve had.”
Huntley did finish the night throwing for 286 yards on 20-of-31 passing (64.5 percent), but had only 7 points to show for it. The junior signal caller fared mostly well in the passing game, but had his own struggles with throws to his receivers.
On Utah’s second drive, Huntley overthrew Demari Simpkins on a third-and-six situation inside Northern Illinois territory, setting Utah up for the blocked field goal. On Utah’s fourth possession, Huntley under threw a pass to Zack Moss in the flat on first down and then overthrew Britain Covey on that same drive on third down.
If you look at the following chart, it shows that most of Huntley’s passes were less than 10 yards and were either behind the line of scrimmage or on the outside. Little, if anything, is going up the middle, making Utah’s passing game fairly one-dimensional and predictable.
Huntley, though, stayed with the game plan and got Utah into Huskies territory on several drives. He even completed nine consecutive successful plays — ones in which Utah needed to pick up the desired yardage for each down-and-distance situation — to end the half and start the third quarter.
His shortest targets were two 8-yard passes in that stretch, and his longest came on a 41-yard pass to Jaylen Dixon. In total, he averaged 16.7 yards per completed pass in that stretch and set up Utah for its first and only offensive touchdown of the night by Zack Moss on a 1-yard rushing play.
As that stretch showed, Utah has the talent in place and the ability to have a good offense, but consistency is key. Throwing for nearly 300 yards means nothing unless you can finish the drive with points. As Whittingham put it: “Nothing really matters what you have success in if you can’t finish drives.”
Utah’s offense looks to rebound as they welcome No. 10 Washington to town Saturday at 8 p.m. at Rice-Eccles Stadium in the annual blackout game.
