Utah vs Oregon or Washington State, next Friday
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We beat CU fairly comfortably in a game that technically didn’t matter, escaped without serious injury, have a full week to heal up as much as possible, didn’t have to expend a lot of emotional energy. So, Utah’s building upward toward the CCG, not like the situation we had in 2018 (emotional comeback win against BYU in the worst scheduled rivalry game in memory).
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Wazzu likewise has a full week to prepare, but last night’s game for them was a big emotional win, their first Apple Cup win in 8 or 9 years. It’s been a crazy year for the Cougs, but credit their coaching staff for doing well when over half the staff was fired.
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Oregon will be playing a highly resurgent Oregon State in their always intense rivalry. IMO, Jonathan Smith should be the PAC coach of the year, the Beavs have made dramatic improvement.
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(Oregon State is no longer in the running for the CCG, but they’ve been on the short end of the stick for a long time in their intrastate rivalry, a distant 2nd to the kingdom of Knight, so I don’t expect much of a drop off from them today - they’d love nothing more than to mimic what we did last Saturday and wreck the Duck’s season further.)
It’s unclear how much damage we did the Oregon last week and how much they’ll be able to rebound. Cristobal’s a good coach, but he was clearly a bit rattled last week in the 2nd half.
Re-calibrating goals is never an easy job, and going from the CFP to the Rose Bowl is an enormous drop, for them. After the win at tOSU they legitimately thought they could be destined for a National Title.
If Oregon can beat a much improved & highly motivated Oregon State, it will be an impressive job by Cristobal of picking his team up off the floor… but I expect they’ll be in an intensive fistfight tonight, and we already saw they were falling like flies against us.
Summary: Utah should have an energy advantage vs either Oregon or Washington State, and a psychological advantage over a reeling Duck team.
From a talent standpoint, Oregon is a more dangerous foe, but Washington State could be a more dangerous opponent from both a psychological and energy standpoint.