Yes, there’s plenty of reasons to be happy about the season and proud of the team for even being on that stage, but here’s a few things that are gonna bother me for a bit:
– Ludwig in the second half. He doesn’t deserve a ton of blame, but there were some issues. Our mid range passing game was open all game. Up 35-28 early in the third, Kincaid reception sets up 1st and 10 at the 11. We proceed to run three straight times for minimal gains and kick a FG. Ohio state answers with FG to make it 38-31. Then we drive and fail on downs after running up the middle on 3rd and 4 and throw a pass to the flats to a route that wasn’t beyond the sticks. I felt the game was lost in those two drives because it was apparent we weren’t going to stop them and couldn’t afford to lose the score cushion.
– Inability to generate pass rush without blitzing was a killer. Stroud and their WRs are absolutely lethal and we gave Stroud all day to find open guys. If you have major secondary issues pass rush is your best friend. It never showed up.
– Mike Williams. What the f***.
– We should have been using our timeouts when OSU was near the goal line on their last drive. They were in guaranteed FG territory so Utah’s only hope was having enough time to match whatever they accomplished. No idea why we decided just to swallow the L with the timeouts in our pocket. Maybe they wanted to save them for potential offensive possession, but there obviously wasn’t gonna be enough time for that to matter.
All that being said, love this team and their fight. Looking forward to Gainesville on Sep 3.