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LOGAN — For Utah State, there is an obsessive belief in the week-to-week process.
"One degree better" signs are hung around the football facilities to emphasize incremental improvement on a consistent basis.
The coaching staff sees the season as linear, with success hinging less upon the results of individual games and more upon the overall progression. There's a "trust the process" mentality, with the belief that it leads to the team playing its best football by the end of the season.
After early season losses for Utah State, postgame comments from players included cliche phrases such as "put our best foot forward" and "trusting our roles." Away from the microphones, the team's leadership has made a concerted effort to keep the team from dwelling upon prior results and external noise.
Days prior to his season-ending foot injury against UNLV, quarterback Logan Bonner was asked his favorite things about college football. He gave an 284-word answer detailing the week-to-week itinerary and how every week is its own "journey."
The hyper-fixation of the process can be frustrating to see. It's easy to think the Aggies are just dismissing past results and are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.
Don't be mistaken, losing has its consequences within the program.
Adjustments are constantly being made and players and coaches alike have been challenged to perform better. But the "sky is falling" response you think a 28-point loss to Weber State would elicit never came; it's hard to blame fans who watched that game, among others, and stopped buying into vows of improvement when dramatic personal and schematic changes didn't come.
Six weeks into the season, however, the Aggies may have turned a corner, posting a 34-27 win over Air Force on Saturday to improve to 2-4 on the season.
Sure, some of the personnel looks different, particularly at quarterback, but outside of injury replacements, the team's lineup and overall DNA is similar to what it was a month ago.
"Well, they've been working the same all year," head coach Blake Anderson said. "And it just hasn't quite translated to the field like you would want. And you get to the point of like 'we're fragile man, this thing could go south real quick if we don't see some fruit from the labor in the sacrifice.' This week particularly was one of the best weeks of practice we've had, and you wanted desperately for it to show on the field."
A bit of validation for the players can go a long way, too.
"This could be huge," Anderson said. "This could be the catalyst for a ton of positive movement, because it did validate all the things that we've been telling them, all the work and sacrifice, all the unselfish behavior."
"It's not easy to stay focused and to pull out a win like that when things have been going the way they had this season," cornerback Andre Grayson said. "But nobody's flinched, nobody's put their head down. The coaches have done a great job of making sure that they stay focused, and they let us know that we're getting there and we're getting better, and it was great to see it pay off; we knew it would and it's just the first step."
Good sentiments are cute, but the Aggies are 2-4 and 0-2 against in-state opponents. They're on track to miss a bowl game, so what's there to play for?
Everything, apparently.
"We talked about divisional play and getting into division, winning our division to get a chance to play for a conference championship," defensive coordinator Ephraim Banda said. "So they know that the reality is; the start does not matter. If we were 4-1 or 1-4, it does not matter because the next (six games) is what's going to dictate where we end up."
Fans who loathe losing to BYU may bemoan that comment, but it's how Banda feels. The win over Air Force improves Utah State to 1-1 in conference play. The Aggies control their own destiny to win the division with six conference games remaining.
For better or worse, numbers rarely gauge Utah State accurately, but ESPN Football Power Index gives the Aggies just a 25.1% chance to reach six wins, a 2.9% chance of winning the division, and a 0.6% chance of winning the conference.
The good news is the schedule dramatically eases up moving forward.
The prior five FBS teams Utah State played have an average ranking of 71.6 in ESPN's SP+ rankings. The same ranking (which often slights the Mountain West on a regular year) puts several of the remaining Aggies opponents in the triple digits during this down year for the conference.
This week's opponent, Colorado State, is 126th, Wyoming is 110th, New Mexico is 121st, Hawaii is 131st, San Jose State is 91st, and Boise State is 76th. That's an average ranking of 37.6 spots worse (109.2) than the teams Utah State went 2-3 against.
If the Aggies play to the level they played on Saturday, the next four games against teams with an 8-16 record, gaining bowl eligibility and entering showdowns against San Jose State and Boise State to close the year is attainable. It'd be similar to what the team did last year when they strung five wins in a row in October and November.
Stay focused on the week-to-week approach and see what happens?
"I think it really is just getting the ball rolling, beating a team like (Air Force)," quarterback Cooper Legas said. "And now we can go on a run."
