Utah loses sixth straight game for first time in Whittingham era as offensive struggles continue

Utah’s sixth defeat in a row, a streak that dates all the way back to a late September loss at Rice-Eccles Stadium to Arizona, is the longest losing streak of the Kyle Whittingham era.
In a 49-24 loss to Colorado, Utah continued to be unable to produce enough on offense, had another special teams blunder, and its defense started to crack as the game wore on.
The preseason Big 12 favorites have won only one conference game — at last-place Oklahoma State on Sep. 21.
If the team continues to play as it did on Saturday, it’s hard to see two wins in Utah’s final two regular-season games — vs. Iowa State and at UCF — which is what Utah needs to become bowl eligible.
Here are three thoughts from the Utes’ sixth straight loss:
For the first 28 minutes of Saturday’s game, Utah’s defense played as well as any opponent has against a talented Colorado offense.
Morgan Scalley’s defense came ready to play in the first half, with linebacker Lander Barton intercepting Buffaloes quarterback Shedeur Sanders on the first play from scrimmage, then returning it to the Colorado 21-yard line, setting the Utes up with great field position for their first drive.
The status of Ute quarterback Isaac Wilson, who was battling illness and only practiced half of the week, was in question leading up to the game, but he was able to play on Saturday, breaking the huddle on the team’s first series, which started out decently.
“He fought and battled and he was not feeling like his usual self, but he hung in there,” Whittingham said of Wilson.
Wilson plowed ahead on a third-and-1 quarterback sneak to gain the first down, but running back Micah Bernard gained just four yards on two runs and Wilson was sacked on third-and-3, bringing on the field goal unit.
That sequence would foreshadow how much of a sunny day in Boulder would go for Utah in its loss to Colorado — especially in the first half.
In the first half, Utah’s defense generally played well in a game where they didn’t have a lot of time to rest on the sideline with the parade of three-and-outs from their offense.
“You can only control what you can control, so we can’t really worry about what’s going on on the other side of the ball. We got to feed off each other. We got to have each other’s backs. We handle our job and that’s it,” Barton said.
Utah generated two takeaways — Barton had an interception and Junior Tafuna fell on a botched snap — and forced three punts on Colorado’s seven first-half drives. The Utes, who have had trouble sacking the quarterback this season, got to the elusive Sanders three times in the first two quarters.
The two first-half touchdowns Utah’s defense allowed were exceptional plays by Colorado.
The first was a fantastic 40-yard touchdown pass by Sanders to Will Sheppard on a free play on fourth-and-5. The second offensive touchdown was set up by a superhuman reception by Heisman contender Travis Hunter, who somehow came down with a jump ball on fourth-and-8. On the next play, Sanders found Sheppard for a score.
Utah was never going to shut Colorado out — the Buffaloes simply have too many playmakers and one of the best quarterbacks in the country — so the Utes needed an offensive performance that bucked the trend of the season.
In the first half, they didn’t get that.
The Utes’ running game was practically nonexistent — Utah rushed for just 31 yards the entire game, which includes -19 yards for Wilson on sacks.
Even taking those sacks out, that’s just 50 yards, which isn’t going to get the job done for Utah, especially on a day where Wilson struggled for much of the game.
“I think just from watching it, we didn’t get any knockoff on the offensive line. No push inside, and you got to get push inside to open up some creases and they played very tough at the line of scrimmage and really couldn’t get anything going,” Whittingham said of the lack of success when running the ball.
The lack of production through the air and the lack of production on the ground go hand in hand — when teams don’t respect the passing offense, they can key in on the run and put extra defenders in the box to make things harder for Utah’s defense.
Wilson struggled throughout the first half, failing to lead a touchdown drive in the first 30 minutes. The true freshman was 8 for 20 for 62 yards and an interception in the first half as the Utah offense failed to take advantage of great field position given to them by the defense, including two drives that started inside the Colorado 30-yard line that ended in a field goal.
“We need to get the completion percentage up. We need to get the interceptions down. That’s the starting point. We’re still right around 50% completion and too many interceptions,” Whittingham said of Wilson.
Wilson was making his decisions too late and missing receivers at times. The most egregious example came in the second quarter, when he had tight end Landen King wide open in the middle of the field. It might have gone for a touchdown if they connected, but Wilson couldn’t put the throw on the money.
Wilson did have a first-half interception, but it wasn’t really on him. He threw a ball with a lot of air under it that Munir McClain couldn’t bring in, and the ball bounced up in the air and into the hands of Travis Hunter.
As bad as the offense was in the first half, the Utes pieced together a couple successful drives in the second half, starting with a 40-yard pass to the corner of the end zone from Wilson to Dorian Singer for the receiver’s first touchdown as a Ute. It was one of the best throws of Wilson’s Ute career and gave the offense life.
A couple drives later, the Utes finally put it all together as they heavily involved their tight ends, with Carsen Ryan catching two passes for 20-plus yards to advance Utah down the field.
Wilson threw a touchdown to tight end Caleb Lohner for the score, and then threw the two-point conversion to offensive lineman Spencer Fano, which cut Colorado’s lead to 35-24 with 8:34 left in the game.
Wilson, who was making reads and decisions a lot faster, completed all seven of his passes on the drive.
“Isaac got in a little bit of a rhythm there for a minute and was connecting on some passes, getting the ball out quicker, going through his read progression quicker. The protection was a little bit better for a period of time, and so I would say that was the reason for the production spurt that we had there,” Whittingham said.
After Tao Johnson forced a fumble on the next drive to give Utah the ball back, Wilson again found Ryan, this time for 21 yards, but then ended any hope of a Ute comeback by throwing an interception.
Wilson was under pressure and scrambled. Instead of throwing the ball away and living to fight another day, he forced a ball as three Colorado defenders started to converge on him and was picked.
“As bad as things were, we still had a chance there. Fourth quarter, we got that turnover and had momentum and were in their territory and proceeded to turn the ball over again,” Whittingham said.
Meanwhile, the defense, which had kept it close in the first half, started to crack. Colorado scored 28 second-half points, including a 37-yard Isaiah Augustave touchdown rush near the beginning of the third quarter and a 47-yard pass from Sanders to Miller near the start of the fourth quarter.
Colorado tacked on two touchdowns in the last five minutes, the first coming on the drive after Wilson’s interception, which featured a 49-yard strike from Sanders to Drelon Miller that set up a Charlie Offerdahl touchdown rush.
After Wilson was strip-sacked with three minutes left, setting Colorado up in the red zone, Hunter cashed in on a shifty five-yard touchdown run.
After allowing a kickoff return for a touchdown in a one-point loss to BYU, the Utes once again had a special teams snafu, this time allowing a punt return for a touchdown.
Down 7-3 in the first half, punter Jack Bouwmeester booted the ball away on a punt without a ton of halftime that got to returner LaJohntay Wester faster than the Utes had planned for. Wester basically ran straight ahead and wasn’t touched by anyone, taking it 76 yards to the house.
The combination of the punt and poor punt return coverage resulted in the second touchdown allowed by special teams this season.
“Didn’t do ourselves any favors on special teams. Let the punt return for a touchdown. That’s two weeks in a row, we’ve had a return for touchdown against us, which is not ideal,” Whittingham said.
The lone bright spot on special teams was kicker Cole Becker, who made all three field goals in his return to Folsom Field, where he played in 2021 and 2022.