‘70% less injuries this camp’: Utah emerges relatively healthy from fall camp, plus how many snaps Kyle Whittingham wants Isaac Wilson to play against SUU

Before fall camp started, Utah coach Kyle Whittingham made it a priority to look at everything he could change or do to ensure his team got to the opening game on Aug. 29 healthy.

In 2023, a laundry list of impact players — including defensive end Logan Fano, running back Micah Bernard and wide receiver Mycah Pittman — suffered season-ending injuries, and star quarterback Cam Rising and star tight end Brant Kuithe missed the whole season because of knee rehab after surgeries.

In October of 2023, Whittingham said he had looked at it from every angle and couldn’t find any common denominator that was leading to the increase of injuries.

“I mean, we’ve looked at every single factor and there is no, at least nothing obvious that jumps out as, ‘Hey, this drill is too dangerous,’ or whatever,” Whittingham said then.

Football is a demanding and violent game, and sometimes a team gets the short end of the stick in regards to injury luck. That’s what happened to Utah last year.

That being said, Whittingham did implement some changes to fall camp this season aimed at minimizing injuries. Utah ramped up slowly, practicing for two days and taking a day off, practicing for three days and taking a day off, etc.

While the intensity of practices didn’t change, the time to recover did.

“As physical as we practice, you got to be able to divvy that up, and so a little bit more emphasis on spreading out those physical periods, spreading out those physical practices, giving our guys time to recover,” defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley said.

Whittingham also implemented modifications in lifting to prevent soft-tissue injuries and looked at the warmup and stretch routines the Utes are doing.

“We’ve looked at every possible angle we have,” Whittingham said this fall.

The good news for Utah fans is that Whittingham’s plan for this fall seems to have worked, as Utah emerged relatively healthy heading into game week.

That came after a spring camp in which Utah finished relatively healthy, with the exception of Levani Damuni, who will miss the majority of the season with a lower-body injury.

“It did. We did the study and the results, put them on paper, and we were about 70% less injuries this camp than last camp, so we did something right this camp,” Whittingham said. “There’s a combination of things. I don’t think it’s any one thing, but the approach we took definitely lent itself to less injuries.”

How much will Isaac Wilson play against Southern Utah?

Every year in college football, an FCS team upsets an FBS team. Whittingham knows you can never take an opponent for granted, and said as much on Wednesday.

Next Thursday, however, the goal for Utah should be to have the game out of reach at halftime so they can play some of their depth players in the second half.

That would include backup quarterback Isaac Wilson, who should get plenty of snaps against Southern Utah in his first college action if everything goes right.

“Ideally a lot (of playing time), but we’ll see how things go,” Whittingham said. “When the time is right, if the time is right, we’re going to obviously try to give him as many reps as we can on Thursday.”

How many of those snaps will be passing plays will remain to be seen, but getting his first real taste of college football will be extremely valuable for the true freshman.