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SALT LAKE CITY — Utah took care of business in its final road game of the regular season Saturday and defeated the Arizona Wildcats 35-7 to claim the program’s 10th win of the season.
The win also landed the Utes an improved ranking following the win. Utah jumped up to No. 6 in the latest Associated Press Top 25 Poll, up one spot, and in the USA Today Coaches Poll, up two spots from last week. The Utes got some help from then-No. 6 Oregon, which dropped a game against Arizona State.
Utah remains the only Pac-12 program with a shot at the College Football Playoff with one game remaining in the regular season. FiveThirtyEight currently gives Utah a 27% chance to make the playoff, and a 56% chance if Utah wins out.
The Utes are joined from the Pac-12 in the rankings by Oregon, which drops to No. 14 in the AP poll and to No. 13 in the Coaches Poll after its loss in the desert; and No. 25 USC, which concluded its regular season Saturday with a 52-35 win over UCLA. The Ducks will still represent the North Division in the Pac-12 Championship game.
Voters in the both the AP and Coaches polls kept their top five programs the same this week, with LSU holding on to its spot as the No. 1 overall team. The Tigers are followed by Ohio State, which defeated a ranked Penn State team, Clemson, Georgia and Alabama.
The upcoming week features four games where both teams are ranked, including a Big Ten showdown against No. 2 Ohio State going on the road to take on rival No. 10 Michigan; No. 5 Alabama traveling to rival No. 16 Auburn; No. 7 Oklahoma on the road against rival No. 21 Oklahoma State; and No. 9 Minnesota welcoming No. 13 Wisconsin to Minneapolis.
The official rankings of the season, the College Football Playoff rankings, will be released Tuesday at 5 p.m. MST.
