Tag: Kyle Whittingham

Lincoln Riley, Kyle Whittingham have traded places the past seven years

Kyle Whittingham’s star is rising and Lincoln Riley’s star is fading. Can Riley change that in 2024?

Go back to 2017. Lincoln Riley, well before he came to USC, made the College Football Playoff at Oklahoma. That year, he coached Baker Mayfield to the Heisman Trophy, and came within an eyelash (overtime in the playoff semifinals) of competing in the national championship game. Kyle Whittingham and Utah had not yet made a single appearance in the Pac-12 Championship Game in 2017. They were trying to figure out how to crack the code in Salt Lake City.

Now, in 2024, everything is different. Whittingham and Utah have beaten Riley and USC three times in the past two seasons. Though the two schools — and hence, the two coaches — won’t meet this season with Utah in the Big 12 and USC in the Big Ten, the Riley-Whittingham dynamic has completely flipped.

Riley is not one of the hot coaches in college football right now. Whittingham is the “it” guy in the sport, a skyrocketing star. College Sports Wire’s top-12 coaching rankings have a “right now” point of emphasis, and Whittingham is No. 2 on the big board.

Here’s College Sports Wire on Whittingham:

“When it comes to consistency, Kyle Whittingham is the perfect example. He joined the Utah Utes in 1996 as an assistant and worked his way up to head coach. He took over in 2005 and is the second-longest tenured head coach. No one seems to do more with less. Whittingham has won two Pac-12 titles over the last three years beating very talented USC Trojans and Oregon Ducks rosters to earn those titles. The Utes should be in good shape to win the Big 12 in the upcoming season.”

Riley has a lot of work to do in the attempt to change how he and USC are perceived.

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Urban Meyer names the best coach in college football

Who is the best current coach in all of college football? Urban Meyer shared his thoughts on a name you don’t often hear called that.

Nick Saban is widely regarded as the greatest college football coach of all-time as he’s led an Alabama dynasty that has lasted the last 15 years.  He’s not the best coach in college football according to Urban Meyer however.

Nor is Kirby Smart, leader of the Georgia Bulldogs and winner of the last two national championships.

Nor is Dabo Swinney, who has won a pair of titles while falling on a bit more difficult of times of late.

So who does the three-time national championship winning head coach Urban Meyer see as the best head coach in college football?

The man that replaced him at Utah, Kyle Whittingham.

Whittingham and Utah, like Notre Dame won their last time out which both happened to come against USC.

I don’t know if Whittingham is the best but he has the Utes vying for yet another Pac-12 championship and seemingly gets as much out of his team annually as any coach in the nation.

 

Stock Report: No. 8 Ducks see nothing but risers in demolition over No. 13 Utah

Stock Report: No. 8 Ducks see nothing but risers in demolition over No. 13 Utah

Over the past day, I’ve tried several times to accurately depict what the No. 8 Oregon Ducks did to the No. 13 Utah Utes in their home stadium on Saturday afternoon, but nothing will ever be as accurate or eye-opening as the way that Utah coach Kyle Whittingham described it after the game.

“That’s as thoroughly and as soundly as we’ve been beaten in a long time, particularly at home,” Whittingham said. “Give Oregon credit, they are a complete football team just like I’ve been saying all week long.”

Utah is not a team that loses at home, especially like that. Going into Saturday, the Utes had won 18 straight games in Rice Eccles Stadium, and lost just one of their last 30 games playing in Salt Lake City. Then Dan Lanning and the Ducks rolled to town and stomped them, putting up 35 points on a defense that is regarded as one of the best in the country, while holding the Utes out of the endzone entirely.

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35-6 was the final score, though Whittingham thinks even that is underselling the Oregon dominance.

“The score wasn’t indicative – the game was a mismatch. It was worse than what the score indicated.”

When you get a game as lopsided as this, it becomes hard to nitpick. In this stock report exercise that we do each and every week, I comb through the stats and try to highlight who improved the most, and who has some room to grow going forward.

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We’re going to see nothing but highlights today. In the first complete game of Oregon’s season, I’m not going to bother trying to find the minute places where things can get better — that’s for the coaches to do. Instead, here are your biggest stock risers after a dominating performance from the Ducks.

Photo Gallery: Ducks completely dominate Utes in statement victory

Photo Gallery: Oregon scored on its opening drive and never looked back with the 35-6 rout over No. 13 Utah.

In what might be considered the most impressive win in the Dan Lanning Era, Oregon stormed into Salt Lake City and crushed the hometown Utes 35-6.

The Duck victory broke Utah’s 18-game home winning streak and put Oregon in a position where they are favorites to go to the Pac-12 title game Dec. 1 in Las Vegas. Of course, they still have USC and Oregon State on the schedule, but both of those games are in Autzen Stadium.

Oregon still has hopes of going to the College Football Playoff and this win would be one of those signature win the committee could point to. The Ducks opened the game with a touchdown and set the tone for the entire day. It was also the ESPN College Gameday game of the week and no doubt millions of people saw the Ducks dominate with the national telecast on Fox.

Utah’s not just playing spoiler this year, coming for the Pac-12 title again

The Utes weren’t just playing spoiler for USC this weekend. Kyle Whittingham and his team have their eyes on a three-peat.

If I told you a team with two consecutive conference titles was written off early in the season because of an injury to their star quarterback but found a way to reach 6-1 with multiple ranked wins, you’d probably groan about the inevitability of it all. You’d conjure images of Alabama in your head, or maybe Clemson‘s decade of dominance in the ACC, a broken record always destined to end atop the mountain no matter how the season transpires.

If I told you Utah would win the Pac-12 again, would you have the same reaction?

Yes, we’re a long way from the Utes taking the conference crown for a third straight year. They need to get through Oregon this weekend first, and it’s been confirmed that quarterback Cam Rising isn’t playing this season. ESPN FPI still has Utah with just a 7.7% chance to win the conference.

But Kyle Whittingham’s squad has the 10th-best strength of record in the country. The Utes are allowing 15.0 points per game, behind only UCLA in the conference, and that number only increases to 20.0 points per game against ranked opponents. Only 11 teams in the country are allowing 20.0 points per game or fewer to ranked opponents, and Utah is the only one of them that has played more than two ranked teams. The Utes are the nation’s No. 6 rushing defense and have a top-50 aerial defense to boot.

We’ve grown so used to Utah, which plays a physical brand of football mostly unseen among today’s top programs, taking it to playoff teams that it’s become a punchline.

While there are certainly worse reputations to have in football, this is a team with back-to-back Rose Bowl appearances. They ended the USC playoff dream last year with a 47-24 beatdown, their second win of the season over the Trojans. Two years ago, when Oregon beat Ohio State in September, the Ducks were 9-1 and the No. 4 team in the country when they came to Utah. The Utes beat them 38-7, then beat them again 38-10 in the conference title game just for good measure.

The Utes get Oregon at home again this weekend, where they have a 27-game win streak. The Ducks are probably the most complete team in the Pac-12, top 20 in the nation both offensively and defensively. Utah is averaging just 23.4 points per game, probably not enough to do any serious damage or garner any playoff buzz even if they win out. But with Washington the only defeated team left in the conference and looking mighty mortal against Arizona State, why not the Utes?

If that home win streak extends to 28 on Saturday? Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

Series History: A look back at the history of Oregon vs. Utah

Series History: A look back at the history of Oregon vs. Utah

The Oregon Ducks will face off against the Utah Utes this Saturday for the final matchup between these two schools as members of the Pac-12. The era of these teams being in the same conference has been short, but it has also been fruitful. Some of the Ducks’ best games over the last ten years have come against Utah.

Most recently, Oregon took down the Utes 20-17 in Autzen Stadium last November. The game came a week after Oregon dropped its second game of the season to Washington. Bo Nix had suffered an injury late in the Washington game and was hindered throughout most of the game against Utah. But, late in the game when it mattered most, Nix used his legs to pick up a game-clinching first down for the Ducks.

Oregon has an all-time record of 24-12 over Utah and a 6-4 record in the Pac-12 era. Since the Utes joined the Pacific Athletic Conference in 2011, the Ducks have had five head coaches, while Utah has remained steadfast with Kyle Whittingham — one of the longest-tenured coaches in the sport.

There are some other memorable moments from this series that I want to highlight. First, there was Utah WR Kaelin Clay’s unforced fumble at the goalline in 2014 that turned into a 99-yard defensive TD for the Ducks. Oregon went on to play in the national championship that year. Another classic moment was Darren Carrington’s spectacular tiptoe catch for a last-second TD to steal the game from the Utes on the road.

While those are some highlights for the Ducks’, Utah has had plenty of success in this series. They have won two of the last three head-to-head matchups between the teams, both of which were 25+ point losses for Oregon. It is also worth mentioning that Utah has won the past two Pac-12 championships, beating the Ducks in Las Vegas for the title back in 2021.

There is a lot of history in this series, but the final game between these two teams as conference opponents could be one of the best. Both teams are ranked inside the top 15 of the AP Poll, Utah is coming off a big win at USC, and Oregon is looking to keep their College Football Playoff hopes alive with a win at Rice-Eccles stadium — a challenge that is a historically near-impossible feat.

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Social media reacts as Utah downs Lincoln Riley, USC once again

The USC Trojans dropped to 0-3 against the Utah Utes under Lincoln Riley and here’s how social media reacted.

During his tenure at Oklahoma, Lincoln Riley struggled with teams known for a tough, physical brand of football. Whether Iowa State, Kansas State or Baylor, Riley’s Sooners were generally in a dogfight with those squads and several times came out on the losing end.

Well, Riley’s toughness struggles have found their way west. The USC Trojans are 0-3 against Kyle Whittingham’s Utah Utes over the last two seasons.

It the fourth season in a row a Lincoln Riley-coached team has lost at least two games in the regular season.

The Trojans are 5-2, while the Oklahoma Sooners are 7-0. If there wasn’t a clearer sign that the coaching change worked out for the better for the Oklahoma Sooners, this season is providing the proof.

Here’s how social media reacted to Riley’s second-consecutive loss.

Also check out how social media reacted to the Sooners win over UCF.

Utah vs Colorado could become the new elite Big 12 football rivalry

With Oklahoma and Texas leaving, @BuffaloesWire and #Utah could form the new #Big12 football showcase. It’s not a hot take.

If you were to say that Utah versus Colorado could become the biggest game in Big 12 football in 2024 and beyond, you would have a reasonable claim to make.

If you made this same statement one week ago, you might have been laughed out of the building, but now that view doesn’t seem like a hot take.

Colorado looked like the real deal in its win over TCU. Utah smashed Florida without Cam Rising at quarterback. Those two teams look good. Meanwhile, the Big 12 — which Utah and Colorado will move to in 2024 — does not look good. Oklahoma looked good, and Texas could become good, but they are both leaving the Big 12 for the SEC next year. Utah and Colorado really could become the two best teams in the Big 12. We’re not guaranteeing anything. We’re not even saying it’s likely.

We are saying there’s a very realistic chance of it happening.

Let’s offer some analysis here to back up our point:

Kyle Whittingham surprised everyone at Pac-12 media day

Everyone who watched or followed #Pac12 media day was amazed when Kyle Whittingham spoke about offense and defense.

There were plenty of notable storylines from Pac-12 media day. USC and UCLA partaking in their final one before leaving for the Big Ten had everybody buzzing.

Utah Utes head coach Kyle Whittingham, the man who has won back-to-back Pac-12 titles, offered up some interesting comments of his own, especially after Utah was picked to finish third in the preseason media poll.

Whittingham’s comments on the state of the game and how it’s an offense-driven game brought some attention as well (h/t Zach Barnett of Football Scoop).

“I believe you’ve got to have a quality defense to compete for a championship, but if you look at the analytics, offense has really taken the forefront for what is more conducive to winning football games. I think it was, offense is responsible for 50 percent of your outcome, defense 35 percent and special teams 15 percent. In that regard, in order to win a championship, you better be pretty good on offense.”

Cam Rising has returned, so the Utah offense is looking dangerous despite losing Dalton Kincaid to the NFL. Nonetheless, the USC Trojans’ offense is arguably the most loaded. Whittingham and the Utes might need to find a way to top them if they want to three-peat in the Pac-12.

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Pac-12 Preview: Are Cam Rising and the Utes being overlooked in 2023?

Utah has won back-to-back Pac-12 championships, but I don’t think many people are picking them again in 2023. Is that a mistake?

As June starts to roll into July, and July eventually leads us to the start of fall camps at the beginning of August, the 2023 college football season will be here before we know it. What a season it projects to be in the Pac-12 Conference, as well. With a handful of College Football Playoff contenders, and a group of Heisman Trophy candidates leading their prospective teams, we could be set up for one of the best football seasons out west that we’ve seen in decades. To help get us prepared, we at Ducks Wire wanted to go through each team in the conference and give a comprehensive breakdown of each school, breaking down their 2023 outlook. Welcome to our Pac-12 Previews. New editions will be published every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday leading up to the start of fall camp. 

Check out our previously published previews: Arizona Wildcats — Arizona State Sun Devils — California Golden Bears — Colorado Buffaloes — Oregon State Beavers — Stanford Cardinal — UCLA Bruins — USC Trojans

If you were to ask any semi-knowledgable fan of college football this offseason who the teams to focus on in the Pac-12 were, you’d likely get the same three answers: USC, Oregon, and Washington.

None of those teams are coming off back-to-back Pac-12 championship victories and a pair of Rose Bowl appearances in the last two years. None of those teams arguably have the best single coach in the conference.

The Utah Utes do, though. So why are we not talking about them more?

It’s not as if quarterback Cameron Rising took off for the NFL this offseason. Like Bo Nix and Michael Penix, he also chose to return for one last ride at this level and will look to go out on top. Sure, Rising is coming off of a knee injury, and it’s not a guarantee that he is 100% healthy by the first week of the season, but he’s still the dynamic gun-slinger that we’ve seen dominate the conference over the past two years.

Is there a world in which we see that dominance span three years? It’s incredibly possible. Here’s our full 2023 season breakdown of the Utah Utes.