Utah 'not satisfied' with its offense as it searches for solutions

SALT LAKE CITY — There's no sugar coating it, the Utah offense has been mediocre through four weeks of the season.

A year removed from averaging 466.9 yards (17th in FBS) and scoring 38.6 points per game, Utah's offensive production has fallen off a figurative cliff. Through the first third of the season, Utah averages just 322.5 yards per game, which is good for 114th (out of 131 FBS teams) in the country. It's even worse for the passing offense, which ranks 121st.

You'd have to go back to the early days of the Pac-12 — when Jon Hays was Utah's starter — to see that low of production from a Utah team.

With the gradual growth Utah has made over its Pac-12 tenure to add talent and depth to the roster, it marks the 2023 season as a setback in the trajectory of the program's continual climb ... at least so far.

"I think I speak for everyone on offense: not satisfied," wide receiver Devaughn Vele said. "Just very blessed to have a great defense. The defense that we have, they've been helping us out a ton, but it's nothing to be happy about with how our performance has been as an offensive unit, so we've got a lot to fix and a lot to work on."

And yet, Utah is 4-0 on the season — largely due to that defense Vele talked about. In many respects, the defense has been the antithesis to the offense and ranks highly in several defensive categories. But what if the offense could be even remotely better?

There are prebuilt excuses for the offense:

• Quarterback Cam Rising and tight end Brant Kuithe are still recovering from ACL injuries last season
• Micah Bernard is out with a season-ending injury
• Chris Curry is recovering from a serious season-ending injury in 2022
• Ja'Quinden Jackson is battling a season-long ankle injury
• Perceived backup quarterback Brandon Rose suffered a serious injury in fall camp
• More injuries to other contributors (Mycah Pittman, Johnny Maea, etc.)
• A backup quarterback controversy/battle
• A watered-down offensive game plan to ensure quarterback Nate Johnson can limit turnovers and digest the plays in real time as a redshirt freshman
• Did we mention injuries yet?

It's a lot of adversity for the offensive side of the ball so early in the season. And yet, there's not one person — coach or player — that sees any of those excuses as a hinderance to what they should be able to do on the field each week.

"It's a collective situation," Vele said. "Obviously, Cam's a game changer — everybody understands that — but at the end of the day, we still have guys on the field that can make plays, and I just feel like we haven't been living up to that potential that we can be at, so it's a lot to work on. Obviously, we really need to look deep down in ourselves this weekend. That's kind of been our motive this week coming in to we're gonna flip that switch around."

So how does Utah flip that switch, and are they even capable of doing it? Is it simply just waiting until Rising (and Kuithe) is cleared to play? Can Utah even get more out of its offense?

Head coach Kyle Whittingham said he isn't worried just yet — at least to the point of panic — even with the odds continually stacked against him this season. Some of the offensive issues may be naturally resolved if and when Rising, Kuithe, Curry, etc. return to the game, but others may just be an ongoing problem that could spell worry.

Regardless, Whittingham said a change in the offense starts with being "more dominant up front" with offensive line play. He said the offensive line — that includes the play of tight ends, too — hasn't been bad, but added that there needs to be "more consistency up front and physicality."

The line has to get enough push in the run game to allow the running backs to get more yards after contact — the revolving door at running back hasn't helped, but I digress — and they have to keep the pocket clean for the quarterback to work. More consistency can equate to a better run game and more opportunities for Utah to expand its already meager passing game.

"There's three or four things that really need to play into it, and probably No. 1 is having a more threatening throw game," Whittingham said. "Because when teams just know you're not going to throw it and load up the box, it's tough sledding in there."

In four games, Utah has run 264 plays, and 177 of them, or 67%, have been run plays. In the last two games, specifically, that number has increased to 72% — 74% against UCLA, alone. Some of that can be attributed to Johnson's ability to escape the pocket with his legs on a broken down play or for designed runs, but at other times it's been a coaching strategy.

Against UCLA, the game plan turned incredibly conservative in the second half when Utah controlled a 14-0 lead — a likely insurmountable lead given Utah's dominance against the Bruins offense. The strategy, it seems, was to limit mistakes and control the clock; and Utah did that by largely keeping the playbook vanilla to the point where there were a handful of boos from the crowd at Rice-Eccles Stadium.

Utah can do more, at least that's the belief. Whittingham said Johnson has 75% of the playbook down and can run the offense, but it's simply a matter of keeping things simple as not to overwhelm the redshirt freshman. But outside of the defense pitching a shutout every game — not likely in the remaining slate — the offense has to put more points on the board.

First off, though, the offense has to get into the red zone and capitalize when there. In 47 opportunities this season, Utah has only gotten to the red zone (inside the opponent's 20-yard line) 11 times. While there, Utah has scored on nine of those drives, but only seven, or 63.6%, have been touchdowns.

Utah averages just 27.0 yards per drive this season and has only been inside the opponent's 40-yard line 20 times this season (42.5%).

"Honestly, we've just got to score in the red zone, and we've got to get to the red zone," tight end Landen King said. "That's up to coach Lud on how we're going to do that, how we're going to get there. But, honestly, I just feel like as an offense, collectively, everybody has something they can do better, all the position groups have something that they can do better."

But remember, Utah is still 4-0 on the season. Those offensive warts don't seem as big compared to if Utah was 1-3 at this point in the season.

"I mean, it's a great position to be in," Vele said. 'Like, we're not complaining about being 4-0, that's far from the truth. We just know that it could be a better feeling of being 4-0. We know we could be a lot better than where we are. We've got a lot to improve on, so we're not satisfied, obviously, but we're grateful to be in this position."

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