Utah football: Penalties, ball security remain issues in need of fixing for Utes

It has the flash and pizzazz and everything promised, but Utah’s new-look offense is also in the midst of some ongoing growing pains. And Utah coach Kyle Whittingham wants to see the early-season mistakes eradicated before the Utes open up Pac-12 play in less than two weeks.

“Overall, we’re still a work in progress, as is every team in the country at this time point in time,” Whittingham said in his Monday afternoon press conference.

Utah’s main problem through the first two weeks is it can’t get out of its own way. Two games in, Utah has accumulated a total of 232 penalty yards on 22 penalties. That’s an average of 116 penalty yards per outing — the most among any Pac-12 team so far this year — and enough to even put a slight damper a 2-0 start.

The bulk of the penalty issues thus far have come on offense as the Utes continue to learn the ins-and-outs of Troy Taylor’s schemes. Whittingham said the numerous holding calls two games boils down to over-aggressiveness by Utah’s receivers in Taylor’s spread attack. He enjoys the tenacity on the outside, Whittingham said, but such penalties are often drive-killers or reasons why they can’t punch it in for a touchdown.

“If you’re a receiver here, you block,” Whittingham said. “That is a positive, but we have got to try and curb the aggressiveness and get it reined in with the technique and fundamentals.”

Sophomore wide receiver Siaosi Wilson, who had 89 yards on five receptions in the win over BYU, said the group must be smarter when blocking on the outside and knowing when to properly engage an opposing defensive back.

“We’ve had a lot of selfish penalties,” he said. “We’ll clean it up and it’ll be smooth sailing from there.”

Wilson was called for offensive pass interference against BYU, a play that negated a touchdown toss from quarterback Tyler Huntley to wideout Darren Carrington II. Replays showed that Wilson did not, in fact, purposely keep the defender from sliding by and covering Carrington II, but it was called nonetheless.

“We’ve had some pick plays where it hasn’t got called. It’s 50-50,” Wilson said. “Can’t sit there and dwell on it.”

“Those are things that we can fix,” Huntley added. ’We’re worried about it, but not too much that it’s going to hurt us in the long run.”

The football has also hit the deck far too often for Whittingham’s liking. Beyond the snapping issues Utah had Saturday in Provo, the Utes have been lax with their ball security, something Whittingham called out even after the season-opening win over North Dakota on August 31. When it continued against the Cougars, it’s evident the Utes have much more polishing to do.

“That’s the first thing [the coaches are] saying when they come into meetings: Ball security. High and tight,” Huntley said. “They’re going to stay on our tail about keeping the ball high and tight. They know the defense going to try get the ball, so we’ve got to stay away from that.”

Entering Saturday’s match-up against San Jose State, Utah has four fumbles — tied for third-most among Pac-12 teams — and lost two against BYU. This year’s preseason camp, Whittingham has noted, featured the least amount of live hitting and tackling during his 13-year tenure as head coach. Asked if there could be a correlation between Utah’s sloppiness protecting the ball and the lack of hits in fall camp, Whittingahm said it could be, but it isn’t an overriding factor.

“We’ve just got to coach it better,” he said. “The starting point is being more demanding. The essence of coaching is teaching and we’ve got to teach it right and we’ve got to demand it get done the right way after we’ve taught it.”

Without the muscle memory of a defender trying to strip the ball away, there’s a chance it’s playing a role, Utah’s coach added.

“It may be that when you’re not going live and people aren’t ripping at the ball constantly, we maybe got into some bad habits,” Whittingham said.