Coach Speak in the Pac-12

The Pac-12 football scene is slowly, but surely starting to work its way out. One thing is for sure. The Washington Huskies are the class of the conference this season. Utah is right on their heels as the next best team, but you wouldn’t guess that based on what the two teams coaches said during the weekly Pac-12 conference call.

On Saturday afternoon at Rice-Eccles Stadium, Utah will take on Washington. It is one of the bigger games in the country as well. ESPN College Gameday will also be broadcasting from the Utah Ute campus to add a little more flavor to the game.

“There are only a few elite coaches in the country and he is one of them. It doesn’t surprise me at all at what he had done.” Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham said when asked about the resurgence of Washington.

It shouldn’t surprise anybody really that Husky head coach Chris Peterson has turned the corner with his program. He’s showed he can coach when he was at Boise State. Petersen now has his recruits taking control of the Husky program and it’s certainly showing.

“It didn’t work for him here. I’m glad it’s working for him there.” Petersen said in reference to Williams on the weekly conference call.

We shall see how it works for Utah and Washington on Saturday afternoon.

Colorado is winning. Finally.

After years of suffering the Buffaloes have found their winning ways and everybody associated with the program couldn’t be happier.

Holding Stanford to five points last week was indicative of how far they have come as a program. The Buffaloes have been known as the bottom feeders of the Pac-12 since they joined the conference.

One good season does not make a program, but if this is any indication Colorado is on the rise.

“The players don’t want to go backwards. They want to keep this going. They have a taste of winning and the players don’t want to lose that taste.” Coach MacIntyre stated earlier in the year.

Here’s hoping that Colorado keeps this positive vibe going.

Meanwhile, in Los Angeles. UCLA’s football season hasn’t gone the way it was supposed to. Fans are upset, players are upset, and head coach Jim Mora is upset.

Mora’s Bruins don’t have a running game at all, Josh Rosen is hurt, and the defense has holes in it. When you have a combination like that it adds up to a 3-5 record.

“These kids are competitive by nature and have been through a lot to just get to where they are, so the focus issue isn’t one.” Mora said.

Then what is it?

Injuries? Lack of playmakers? Coaching?

The Bruins lost at home against Utah last weekend in a shootout. In that game, Joe Williams ran wild all over the Bruin defense. To say Coach Mora wasn’t pleased about it would be an understatement.

When asked about the lack of a run defense last weekend, Mora was complimentary of Utah.

“I would give Utah credit for coming up with a scheme that we could not adjust to.” Mora said.

He was not willing to get into specifics about what the Bruins could have done differently. Something needs to be done differently because they have Colorado in a couple of weeks. UCLA has the bye week to figure things out.

Bruin fans are hoping they use it well.

At the end of the day, the Pac-12 is dog eat dog conference and the coaches on these conference calls know that. The coaches have to put the best face forward when talking about their teams, but we know that. Coaches will coach, but players make plays. Which teams will make those plays in the last half of the season? Who knows, but it will be fun to watch.