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LOS ANGELES – What would you like to talk about first regarding the University of Utah?

The fact this is all happening without Cam Rising at the wheel? Better yet, the fact this is all happening with Bryson Barnes at the wheel? The sheer number of depth-chart injuries, season-ending or otherwise, which has made this level of success almost nonsensical?

What about the fact it’s almost Halloween, and in spite of all the setbacks, every attainable goal remains on the table for these Utes? What about Utah saving its season Saturday night coming at the expense of USC, at the LA Coliseum, which has been a house of horrors for most of the Utes’ Pac-12 tenure.

Before any of that, we should talk about how, regardless of what anyone wearing red and white might say, this one was bigger than just another game. Bigger because of what Utah has overcome to get here with its season intact, bigger because of who the opponent was, bigger because what a win meant this season, imperfect and messy, can still become.

Whatever you thought about this Utah team, good or bad, as it walked into the Coliseum, you were probably right, but here’s the deal: This Utah team, warts and all, is right where it wants to be, right where you thought it could be on Oct. 22 if everything went smoothly. Very little has gone smoothly, so what does that say about these Utes?

If you’re going to beat the champ, or at least keep the champ from playing for another conference championship on Dec. 1, it’s going to take a knockout, nothing less.

The anatomy of a game-winning drive

Up 14 points late in the third quarter, Utah tried to give the game away.

The one gignatic mistake Barnes made was trying to force a third-and-11 pass into traffic deep in his own end. That was picked off by USC safety Calen Bullock for a 30-yard touchdown return to cut the deficit to 5 points at 28-23 with 13:28 left.

Later, after Utah went conservative while nursing a 31-26 lead, electrifying Trojans true freshman Zachariah Branch returned a Jack Bouwmeester punt 61 yards down to the Utah 11-yard line. Caleb Williams scored on a keeper on the first play of the ensuing drive, but the 2-point try was no good, leaving USC ahead 32-31 with 1:46 remaining.

Utah kicked to Branch all night on punts and kickoffs, a move that seemed to make no sense given Branch’s prowess as a returner, and that last one finally burned the Utes, at least momentarily.

To this point, save for the pick six, Barnes had been very good. He looked very comfortable against USC’s defense, but was now being asked to drive the Utes down the field in a sequence it had to have.

On third-and-9 from his own 26, Barnes hit Mikey Matthews over the middle for 8 yards, at which point Utah would have gone on fourth-and-1 at the 34, but a helmet-to-helmet hit on Barnes by defensive tackle Bear Alexander yielded a targeting call, which held up on review to set Utah up at its 49-yard line.

Barnes rushed for 13 yards on first-and-15 after a false start on Spencer Fano, Ja’Quinden Jackson added 1 yard on third-and-2, and then Jackson for 2 yards out of a timeout on fourth-and-1. As the pocket collapsed on second-and-15, Barnes scrambled for 26 yards along the right sideline for a first down at the USC 19 in what may have been the second-most significant play of his career behind the Rose Bowl touchdown pass to Dalton Kincaid.

Becker’s 38-yard field goal after Barnes took a knee on first down to center the ball for his kicker came as time expired, setting off a celebration that felt like 2021 at the LA Coliseum. After Utah won that game in the days following Aaron Lowe’s death, many of the thousands of Utes fans in attendance made their way to the front row of the lower mezzanine to join the celebration and sing on the alma mater.

This game, and that final drive largely belong to Barnes, but Becker deserves immense credit. As the drive unfolded and the venerable building got loud, Becker calmly took practice kicks off to the side, ignoring everything around him, then drilled the winner right down the middle.

Becker’s commitment from the NCAA transfer portal via Colorado was expected to be an upgrade that was mostly a problem in 2021 and 2022. That certainly was the case Saturday after he hit four extra points and two fourth-quarter field goals, including a 33-yarder earlier in the period.

The defining moment(s) of Bryson Barnes’ career

If you ask someone what is the biggest moment of the former Milford High star’s college career, there are options.

The aforementioned Rose Bowl touchdown to Kincaid and nearly stealing that game might come up first. The start and win at Washington State last October to essentially keep that particular Pac-12 title defense alive is up there, as is the 70-yard touchdown pass on the first play of scrimmage this season against Florida.

Those are all valid, all good choices, but I submit Saturday night is bigger than all of them.

First, let’s set this up.

Barnes was the opening-night starter vs. Florida with Rising not back from knee surgery. He was ineffective at Baylor and got benched for Nate Johnson, but found his way back to the field vs. Oregon State.

Barnes was the starter against Cal, and at that point it seemed clear that the job was his. No more two-QB stuff, not more waffling; it was his show. Additionally, Utah, with one conference loss, really can’t afford another one, so that is Barnes’ responsibility now. Week after week, keep the season alive.

Barnes went 14-for-23 for 235 yards, three touchdowns, and the interception return for a touchdown, plus 57 more yards and a touchdown on the ground. He looked comfortable vs. Cal, but he looked even more comfortable, more capable against USC.

The emergence of Sione Vaki as a multidimensional option on offense, plus the rushing attack getting off a milk carton, have helped keep Barnes from having to throw a ton and feel like he has to do everything.

Whether or not there is a correlation, who knows, but these two games from Barnes have coincided with Whittingham no longer waiting until late in the week for Rising’s status, instead making a decision Monday and allowing Barnes to take all of the first-team reps once Rising was ruled out. Getting all of the reps over the course of a game week has to do something in the way of confidence and comfortability, both of which Barnes has shown off.

Barnes hit on six passes of at least 14 yards, including a 53-yard touchdown pass to Vaki on a wheel route, which they missed on a couple of times vs. Cal, and another wheel route to Vaki later, this one for 36 on his very first pass after the pick six.

I thought offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig called a good game, even if some of the late stuff was too conservative. Ludwig going right back to Barnes for the 36-yard pass after the pick six says a lot about 1) Barnes’ handle on the offense, and 2) Ludwig’s trust in Barnes to make a play.

The Rose Bowl touchdown, the Washington State win, the 70-yard pass vs. Florida, and yeah, the fact Barnes grew up farming pigs in Milford, have all made him a cult legend among Utah fans. If you weren’t on board with that, his effort against USC should have sealed it.

Slowing down Caleb Williams and USC

Numbers don’t tell everything, but we’ll start there anyway.

USC entered the night ranked ninth nationally in total offense (492.6), eighth in passing offense (332.9), and second in scoring offense (47.3). The Trojans went for 401 yards of total offense, Caleb Williams went 24-for-34 for 256 yards and no touchdowns, plus 27 yards and a score on the ground as they scored 32 points. Those are wins for Utah.

Now, for some nuance.

Saturday night began much like last season’s two games, USC hitting on chunk plays, getting what it wanted, scoring a bunch of early points. After Barnes hit Vaki on a 53-yard wheel route to open the scoring, USC got to work.

Williams for 13 yards on the ground on third-and-4, followed by a MarShawn Lloyd’s 45-yard touchdown run started the USC scoring. Lloyd later got 15 yards, followed by Tahj Washington making a tremendous 51-yard diving catch down to the Utah 1. Two plays later, Zachariah Branch on an end-around, a play so well designed and so well executed, that no one was stopping it.

Right there, maybe you thought Utah is not equipped for a track meet (hand up). Right there, maybe you thought the Utes were out of good juju in spite of the injuries (hand up again).

Two things happened. Much like last season’s two games when USC got it going early, Utah’s defense then started to settle in and figure some things out. With that, after netting 100 first-quarter rushing yards, USC inexplicably stopped running the ball in finishing with 145 yards for the night, 86 of them from Lloyd, who has had ball-security issues. He lost one against Utah, and had another lost fumble pulled back as an incomplete pass after review.

Being less of a threat to run meant Utah was happy to sit back in coverage and dare Williams to throw. There was not much blitzing, not much exotic stuff from Morgan Scalley, because the point was to keep Williams in the pocket and make him throw. He is at his most dangerous when he is on the move, keeping plays alive with his feet, or taking off entirely into the open field.

Scalley has coached 12 quarters of football against Trojans head coach Lincoln Riley and offensive coordinator Josh Henson. Off the top of my head, Scalley has outdueled those two in at least seven, maybe even eight or nine of the 12 quarters. That’s no small feat given he’s scheming for Williams and USC’s stable skill-position studs.

Other things on my mind

• Whittingham announcing Cam Rising and Brant Kuithe will be shut down for the season offers a handful of interesting subplots. If Rising returns, do any of the QBs hit the portal? Another year of Rising, means another year of no one else starting, whether it be Nate Johnson, Brandon Rose, or Barnes, a fourth-year sophomore with two years of eligibility remaining.
• The bye helped, but Ja’Quinden Jackson is not playing at 100% with an ongoing ankle issue. That’s not a guess, you can clearly see it when he runs, but he’s gutting it out. Twenty-six carries for 117 yards, including seven carries of at least 6 yards. His 2-yard push on fourth-and-1 on the final drive won’t get enough love, but if he doesn’t get that, the game is over.
• The Sione Vaki experiment isn’t an experiment, but rather a critical, indispensable part of an offense that has awoken after being bogged down in mud for most of the first six weeks. Vaki had five catches (on six targets) for 149 yards and two touchdowns. Of those 149 yards, 113 of them came after the catch as he added 68 yards on nine carries, giving him 217 all-purpose yards on 14 touches. There are now two weeks of tape on Vaki playing offense. Oregon entered the day ranked 13th in total offense. Just food for thought.
• Of all the injuries Utah has dealt with this fall, Lander Barton’s season-ender feels like a real crusher. That’s your leading tackler and your best linebacker, neither of which are easily replaced. Stanford transfer Levani Damuni is now going to be asked to do a lot to try and at least make up for some of that loss.
• We all said during the week that Utah would have to do a few things to get out of the Coliseum with a win, run the ball and control the clock among them. The Utes rushed for 247 yards and had the ball for almost 60% of the clock. Utah had three drives that all lasted at least eight plays and 4:12. It was a quintessential, old school-type of Utah game, one that Whittingham will take each and every time if made available to him.
• Utah AD Mark Harlan indicated on the ESPN 700 pregame that he hoped to find a way to play in Southern California in the future. I find it hard to believe either USC or UCLA would want to schedule Utah given what Big Ten schedules are going to entail. In theory, Utah has a better chance of playing a neutral-site game at SoFi Stadium as a way of playing in Southern California than it does playing USC at the Coliseum or UCLA at the Rose Bowl any time soon.

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