There isn’t much in Tyler Huntley’s living room, just a coffee table, a few chairs, and about 15 yards from one side to the other. Some nights, the Utes’ new starting quarterback and his roommate, wide receiver Raelon Singleton, stay up well past midnight playing catch in there.
“We’re always throwing it,” Singleton said.
“We haven’t broken anything,” Huntley added.
Well, consider that progress for a team that struggled so much in tight quarters last year.
Red-zone problems haunted Utah all season, when they finished 5-4 in conference play. But as they embark on a new campaign — led by a new offensive coordinator, Troy Taylor, and a new quarterback — the Utes hope to be able to turn one of their greatest weaknesses into one of their strengths.
Utah ranked 106th in red zone offense among all Football Bowl Subdivision programs last season. Arizona was the only Pac-12 school to be less efficient converting near the goal line. The Utes made 54 trips inside the 20. The net results: 19 rushing touchdowns, eight passing touchdowns and 15 field goals.
“There are a lot of things we didn’t do well in the red zone,” coach Kyle Whittingham said. “We have a lot of things to improve on there, which we think we have in spring and through fall camp. It will be a whole new look with [new coordinator Troy Taylor’s] offense. But that was a definitely liability for us last year and a negative effect.
“If we had been really good in the red zone, it would have been a completely different story.”
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Instead, the story of Utah’s offense was filled with too much predictability. As drives progressed and the end zone got closer, Salesi Uhatafe would get down into his stance and see the same thing coming. “The safeties started to walk up more,” the Utah offensive lineman said. Now the Ute line was left to sort out defensive tackles and linebackers and defensive backs all keyed on the Utah backfield.
But behind a talented offensive line, the Utes stayed committed to running the ball and it may have cost them at times.
Excluding penalties and field goals, running plays accounted for more than 67 percent of the Utah’s red-zone snaps. The ball often stayed with quarterback Troy Williams (20.8 percent), with running backs Joe Williams (18.8), Armand Shyne (12.1) and Zack Moss (12.8) doing a big chunk of the lifting near the goal line, too.
In one of the more frustrating moments for the Ute offense, Moss was stopped a yard short of the end zone as time expired in Utah’s 28-23 loss at Cal. Utah had six plays in the red zone in the final two minutes, but was unable to convert. Now you can count Moss among those hopeful for a more successful campaign in 2017.
“It’s going to help us tremendously because, last year, everybody knew we were going to run the ball in the red zone,” Moss said. “We can go spread in the red zone. We’ve got a lot of looks that we run, lot of plays, lot of trick plays, stuff like that. I think that’s going to help us be higher in the nation in [red zone] percentages.”
Huntley, whom Whittingham called a “true dual-threat” at quarterback, isn’t carrying baggage from last year with him.
“The struggles last year just came from a few mistakes on our part,” the sophomore said. “This year, we’re just going to come out and perform. We don’t have that on our minds or nothing. We just going to come out and perform and score touchdowns.”
And Huntley’s roommate believes they’re ready for a breakthrough.
“Last year, it was frustrating just getting 3, 6, 9 [points], you feel me? Getting field goals. Even though a win is a win, we want to put up a whole bunch of points on teams,” Singleton said. “… We for sure gonna do that. You’re gonna get a taste in the first game.”
Utes in the red zone<br>Total trips: 54<br>Total scores: 42<br>Conversion percentage: 77.5<br>Rushing touchdowns: 19<br>Passing touchdowns: 8<br>Field goals: 15