Utah did what they had to do on the road in Pullman to stay in the hunt for the PAC-12 Championship despite playing backup quarterback Bryson Barnes, in for their injured starter Cam Rising. In spite of having the best defense in the PAC-12 the Cougars have lost their last four, averaging just 12.5 points per game—way short in a conference that is putting up huge offensive numbers this year. With an overall record of 4-4 they’ll need to win two of their last four against Stanford, Arizona State, Arizona, and Washington to become bowl eligible. For 6-2 Utah they should have a pretty easy time of it the next couple of weeks against Arizona and Stanford, possibly able to keep Rising out another week at least before they face a make-or-break game in Eugene against Oregon on November 19th—the same day USC meets UCLA in the Rose Bowl.
Not a whole lot going on in the first fifteen minutes of this one for either team with a combined 4 punts and 1 missed field goal. But after holding Utah to a three-and-out at the end of the 1st Qtr, Washington State would take the ball 61 yards in 2 minutes to draw first blood on a Cameron Ward 29 yard TD pass to De’Zhaun Stribling to go up 7-0. Seven plays, 65 yards and four minutes later Utah would tie it up on a six yard TD run by Freshman RB Ja’Quindan Jackson. Utah would score one more time in the half to go up 14-7 on a Jaylon Glover TD run after holding the Cougars to a three-and-out with just under three minutes left.
Although Washington State got the ball back right after the break, as far as the scoreboard goes their third quarter output matched that of the 1st Qtr with Utah going up 21-7 on a Bryson Barnes 5 yard TD pass to Jaylen Dixon with just 1:24 left in the period. The Cougars tried to come back in the 4th picking up a quick TD on their next possession in just under two minutes on a Cameron Ward 7 yard TD run and had a chance to tie the game after a Utah fumble on their own 37 yard line six minutes later. But after seven plays they had only advanced the ball 12 yards, so sitting 4th and 14 at the Utah 25 with almost six minutes left Place Kicker Dean Janikowski kicked a 42 yard field goal to close within four at 21-17. But if you had to pick one thing the Utes are always good at it’s eating the clock and moving the chains as they spent the next five minutes moving just 29 yards down to the Washington State 25 yard line as time expired.
Washington State’s Cameron Ward was about as precise as a QB can get connecting on 87% of his passes for 222 yards, 1 TD and no interceptions as well as rushing for 28 yards and another score. But other than Ward the Cougar ground game was dismally anemic, rushing 19 times for a mere 42 yards. Although Utah’s backup QB Bryson Barnes wasn’t as accurate as Ward he was still very respectable connecting on 17-of-27 for 175 yards, 1 TD, and no picks while rushing 8 times for an additional 51 yards. Freshman RB’s Jaylon Glover and Ja’Quindon Jackson collectively added 119 more yards on the ground and 1 score a piece to the Utah 169 yard total. Utah had possession of the ball for 10 more minutes; led in 1st Downs, 19-to-14; Total Yards, 344-to-364, and were successful converting third downs about half the time compared to 30% for the Cougars. The Utah defense played a big part in shutting down the Cougar offense with 4 sacks and 10 tackles for loss which really hobbled the Washington State ground game.
Utah heads back home to host Arizona next Saturday while Washington State will hit the road to Palo Alto to take on Stanford—currently in the basement of the conference, one spot lower than last season.