Dampier finished with four passing touchdowns and a rushing touchdown.<\/p>\n
(William Wotring | AP) Utah Utes quarterback Devon Dampier (4) makes a pass during the first half of an NCAA college football game against West Virginia Mountaineers, Saturday, Sept, 27, 2025, in Morgantown, W.Va.<\/p>\n
Morgantown, W.Va. \u2022 A week ago, all Kyle Whittingham could do was compliment his punter. <\/p>\n
\u201cLooking for positives, I thought a punter punted the ball very well. He did a good job,\u201d Whittingham said of Orion Phillips, following Utah\u2019s 34-10 loss to Texas Tech last Saturday. <\/p>\n
It was the only good thing Utah\u2019s head coach could honestly say about his team that afternoon. This weekend, however, Whittingham couldn\u2019t say anything about Phillips.<\/p>\n
Why? Because the Utes (4-1, 1-1 Big 12) didn\u2019t punt the ball once in their 48-14 blowout win over West Virginia on Saturday.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s usually a good sign.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were very balanced,\u201d Whittingham said on Saturday. \u201cWe had over 500 yards of offense and 200-plus rushing and 200-plus throwing. So a lot of good stuff going on there.\u201d <\/p>\n
The Ute offense looked like the well-oiled machine that catapulted it to a 3-0 start on Saturday. Junior quarterback Devon Dampier was back to his old self, finishing the contest with 237 passing yards, a career-high four touchdowns and one interception.<\/p>\n
\u201c[We wanted] to use last week as fuel,\u201d Dampier said. \u201cIn the facility, we had a two-day rule, as soon as we go over it\u2019s on to the next game, and [we have to] focus on our next opponent.\u201d <\/p>\n
He also had 11 rushes for 33 rushing yards and one touchdown on the ground. But in this game \u2014 following a week of social media chatter and speculation surrounding the quarterback\u2019s health \u2014 Dampier made things happen through the air. <\/p>\n
He sliced and diced the Mountaineers\u2019 defense from the pocket. The quarterback\u2019s longest throw of the day came on a 32-yard touchdown floater to redshirt senior wide receiver Ryan Davis, who played with Dampier at New Mexico.<\/p>\n
(William Wotring | AP) Utah Utes players celebrate after defeating West Virginia Mountaineers, Saturday, Sept, 27, 2025, in Morgantown, W.Va.<\/p>\n
Dampier made other impressive throws, too, answering questions about his ability as a passer. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe have the best offensive line in the country,\u201d Dampier said. \u201cInstead of taking those running lanes, I was able to make a lot more plays just sitting in the pocket today. That was a little bit of the emphasis. We take whatever the defense gives us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Outside of Dampier, the Utes also made noise on the ground. Seven different players touched the ball, combining for 242 rush yards and averaging 5.1 yards per carry.<\/p>\n
Successfully running the ball helped open up Utah\u2019s passing attack in a big way, which was something that was lacking against Texas Tech. In that contest, Utah\u2019s run attack was limited to 101 yards and 3.1 yards per carry. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that that was something that hurt us last week, and we needed to be able to push the ball down the field better,\u201d Whittingham said. \u201cWe did that this week. Receivers stepped up to answer the challenge. We had a good scheme going in \u2014 a dose of running, pass and play action off the run.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another positive for Utah\u2019s offense was Davis. He nabbed seven receptions for 107 yards and one touchdown. He\u2019s quickly taking over as Utah\u2019s No. 1 wide receiver, while Whittingham and the Utes wait for other playmakers to step up at that position.<\/p>\n
\u201cRyan\u2019s got a great feel for finding the open space,\u201d Whittingham said. \u201cHe\u2019s a very crafty receiver with great hands, toughness and courage.\u201d <\/p>\n
With Utah\u2019s first Big 12 win of the season under its belt, the program will now slide into the bye week with its offense back on track. The next stretch of games, however, will be an even bigger test. <\/p>\n
Utah Utes offensive lineman Jaren Kump (68) and Utah Utes offensive lineman Michael Mokofisi (52) block West Virginia Mountaineers defensive lineman Eddie Kelly Jr. (1) during the first half of an NCAA college football game, Saturday, Sept, 27, 2025, in Morgantown, W.Va. (AP Photo\/ William Wotring)<\/p>\n
First up is a meeting with the defending Big 12 champions, Arizona State, on Oct. 11. and then a matchup against in-state rival BYU a week later.<\/p>\n
There, the Utes will learn if they\u2019re real conference-title contenders and if their new-look offense can hang with the big dogs at top of the conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t want to sit on a loss ever \u2014 but sitting on it for two weeks is double the torture,” Whittingham said. \u201cIt\u2019s really big to be able to end the first half of the season on a positive note.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully that gives us momentum heading into the next contest.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dampier finished with four passing touchdowns and a rushing touchdown. (William Wotring | AP) Utah Utes quarterback Devon…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":186877,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[399,398,396,397,99,22887,22888],"class_list":["post-186876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-football","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-sports","tag-university-of-utah","tag-utes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}