Frustration mounts following another uninspiring offensive performance from Utah

The frustration was evident after Utah’s 13-7 loss to TCU.

From the players, to the coaches, to the fans (who booed the offense and the coaching staff multiple times on Saturday), everyone left Rice-Eccles Stadium unhappy.

After the Utes’ third loss in a row — their first three-game losing skid since 2017 — there’s more questions than answers.

This season was one the Utes thought could potentially be special. Instead, it’s turned into one of the most disappointing seasons in recent memory.

Picked to finish first in the Big 12 in the preseason poll, not only is Utah out of contention for the conference title with five games remaining, but bowl eligibility is now not a guarantee.

Utah is favored on the road against Houston (which beat TCU 30-19) next week, but after that, the schedule gets significantly tougher — vs. BYU, at Colorado, vs. Iowa State and at UCF. Unless the offense makes a U-turn, the Utes could be on the outside looking in during bowl season.

In each of Utah’s three losses, the offense has taken a step back — from moving the ball fairly well against Arizona but shrinking in the red zone, to a dreary performance from Cam Rising on basically one leg, to last night, where the Utes scored just once in 14 drives.

It’s obvious that this season was predicated on the Utes having a healthy Rising, and unfortunately for Rising and Utah, the veteran quarterback was unavailable for the majority of the season.

Isaac Wilson has been thrust into the starting job for four out of Utah’s seven games, and while this experience will pay dividends down the road if Wilson is indeed the quarterback of the future, it’s a tough watch in the meantime.

There’s been flashes of potential this season, but Wilson was in high school less than a year ago, and he’s played like it. He’s turned the ball over too many times, he’s holding the ball too long at times, and his ability to read the field needs to improve.

What hasn’t helped him? The constant back-and-forth with Rising’s status for much of the season — including dual game plans and splitting reps at times in practice — uninspired and predictable play-calling from offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig, and, last night, poor offensive line play.

Wilson was supposed to sit behind Rising and learn from him this season, but that didn’t happen.

“A guy like that didn’t expect to start this year and now all of a sudden he’s a starting quarterback and we have to do a better job at helping him make plays when needed and just doing our (expletive) job, honestly,” tight end Brant Kuithe said on the ESPN 700 postgame show.

With Rising out for the year and Ludwig able to game plan solely around Wilson, the thought was that Utah’s offense would at least look better than last week. Instead, it looked even worse.

“There’s no mysteries to what our issues are and showing up for three weeks in a row now and so we’ve got to look at everything really hard in the next 48 hours and make some tough decisions and see where we’re at,” Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said.

No one is expecting Utah’s offense to look like it did with a healthy Rising in 2021 and 2022, but right now it’s as exciting as watching paint dry.

“Guys got to make plays. Speaking to myself, I had a drop. Just got to make more plays, missing assignments, missed blocks. Just not really playing together right now and going to have to go back to the drawing board and figure this (expletive) out,” Kuithe said.

The exasperation with the offense is starting to show.

Dorian Singer has kept his head down and worked hard, leading the team in receptions (33) and receiving yards (486), but his talent hasn’t been utilized to its maximum potential. After the loss, he posted “wasted talent” on Instagram.

At least Singer has seen the field. He and Money Parks have been good, but receivers like Damien Alford (610 yards in 2023) and Munir McClain (287 yards in 2023) haven’t really seen the field.

During the preseason, Utah said it was six deep at tight end, but Ludwig hasn’t really shown that to be true.

Yes, Caleb Lohner has been utilized at times in the red zone, and Carsen Ryan got some run in the Utah State game, but overall, it’s been Kuithe and pretty much no one else. Non-Kuithe tight ends have combined for nine total targets this season.

Landen King, who had 14 receptions for 166 yards and three touchdowns last year, has one target and zero catches this year. After the TCU game, he posted “free me” to his Instagram story.

The rushing game behind Bernard has been all but abandoned. While Bernard has been great this season, a change of pace would be nice at times from someone like Mike Mitchell or Jaylon Glover, but that hasn’t happened over the last three contests.

Seven games in, is Utah’s offense really going to undergo drastic change and start trying to incorporate players that haven’t played this season? We’ll see.

With their preseason hopes and dreams dashed, all that’s left for the Utes this season is playing for pride. Utah can’t let this season spiral any further than it already has, and a trip to Houston has become the most important game on the schedule.

“We have Houston on Saturday, we got to put in the work, can’t let this loss go into next week and we got Houston. If we don’t play the way we need to and prepare the way we need to, we’ll lose again just like we did this week. So we need to get to work and get our minds right,” Kuithe said.