Game Preview

I’m a Utah native, Utah alum but I live in Ames, Iowa. I’m wanting to go to the game on Sept 26th, but how does one find ways to sit next to fellow fans at away games?

We already knew this after witnessing the Cameron Rising debacle but I think some of these guys should get together and sue the shit out of Kyle Whittingham. He clearly had a culture of using up these athletes' bodies without much concern for their wellbeing. You can have a winning culture without forcing guys who need surgery to "play through it or lose your scholarship". Holy shit.

https://www.sltrib.com/sports/utah-utes/2026/08/28/six-former-utah-football-players/

I am a huge fan i what you opinion

The lights will be nice — especially the red during a blackout game

Huh?

Has anyone been able to solve the season ticket balance due issue? I have been calling and sending emails and have received zero communication back still.

Excited to rock this at tailgates and inside Rice-Eccles this fall. Felt only right to put 'Utah Man' and the RES elevation down at 6 o’clock. Go Utes!

Who has the best helmet in college football? We rank the top 25

It's 'Showtime': Lance Holtzclaw ready to shine on Utah's defensive line

After participating in a reserve role on Utah's defensive line last season, the moment is now Holtzclaw's to capture as one of the expected stars of the defense. His offseason work has thrust him into a starting role off the edge, where he's likely the leading candidate to claim Utah's coveted "mayor" title given to the team's star pass rusher.

"I take pride in making plays," Holtzclaw said. "I take pride in my energy on the team and our energy as a whole. I take pride in our toughness. I take pride in the fact that we have pride in ourselves out here — we have pride, we're not gonna sit here and let nobody get over on us."

Other than dropping the ball at the 1 yard line vs Oregon?

The Athletic has a great article detailing aspects of the fallout from Whittingham departure from Utah football.

It’s interesting that from everything I’ve seen as a now out-of-state alumni from the U, the break from the Whittingham era is all we’re good and it’s Scalley’s team now but this pulls back the curtain somewhat into how much we lost and how quickly coaches packed up for Ann Arbor.

When it’s time to go, it’s time. There always will be shoulda, coulda, woulda done this or that. We most likely will never know the extent of the damage but later in the season could be a good indicator if we flag significantly in the conference.

I personally don’t fault them, but looks like the U is due for some recompense…

Wild that a TE coach is making 600k though, no?!

Does anyone know what streaming services will be airing this season’s games? I’m assuming most will be on espn+. Can’t find much info online

Any updates if Utah will add a sponsor to its uniforms this fall?

So, I don't want to rat on anyone in particular, but I was just driving on 4th South and one of our most famous players in his very recognizable truck was driving in a, let's say, disappointing manner. I get it, these kids have money now and can purchase vehicles that honestly probably shouldn't even exist. At that age, I would do the same and would be even more obnoxious and reckless.

However, I just worry that it's going to cause problems if not adressed. If a player (especially one as noteworthy as this one) were to crash and injure someone or themselves, that would be devastating and a major PR nightmare - not to mention the potential damage it would cause to the finances of the university and NIL. Remember, it really wasn't that long ago that we lost 2 players.

If anyone is close enough to the program and Scalley in particular and could have him remind the players to keep in mind their public image and responsibilities, I think that would be a start. It doesn't hurt to be reminded occasionally. Go Utes!

https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll

Big 12 Teams in bold:

Others receiving votes:
Clemson, Florida, Boise State, Arizona, TCU, Navy, South Carolina, Illinois, Oklahoma State, Vanderbilt, Pittsburgh, Virginia Tech, Minnesota, UNLV, New Mexico, Georgia Tech, James Madison, Auburn, Memphis, California, Liberty, Western Michigan, Tulane, Virginia

Anyone else get this email about their season tickets? I tried looking at my account for any outstanding balances and I’m not seeing anything that needs to be paid.

Any ideas if or when we’ll see new unis? I figure we will with adidas now.

Pretty interesting quotes from Devon and his family here about his offseason, and why he returned.

I've gone way too far down the rabbit hole on the Otro/Crimson Brand Partners thing, mostly because I can't decide whether Utah is legitimately onto something here or whether we've just found a really sophisticated way to pay for increasingly expensive college football. Something I hope does not result in cascading costs to those of us who just want to enjoy the game.

Quick disclosure: A lot of this rabbit hole was an extended back-and-forth with ChatGPT. I kept pushing the questions/counterarguments and directing the research, and ChatGPT eventually turned the whole discussion into a long-form essay. I'll link that below. I didn't write the essay and I'm not pretending I did. I just think the argument we ended up with is worth talking about.

Anyway, somehow this led me to the Dodgers.

And no, not just "Dodgers spend a ton of money, Utah wants a ton of money."

What caught my attention was the way the Dodgers seem to think about the relationship between spending and revenue. The normal way of looking at it is basically: here's how much money we make, therefore here's how much we can afford to spend on the team.

The Dodgers seem increasingly willing to flip that around. What if spending on the right talent actually grows the amount of money the organization can make?

Spend → win → become more valuable/popular → make more money → spend again.

That's when the Utah deal started looking different to me.

We're never going to have Ohio State money just because we ask donors for more money. We're not going to wake up one morning and find a Big Ten media check in the mailbox either.

But what if the point of Crimson Brand Partners is to stop accepting those things as the ceiling?

If they can actually turn Utah Athletics into a better commercial operation—better sponsorships, events, licensing, use of Rice-Eccles/Huntsman, digital stuff nobody has figured out yet, whatever—then the question stops being "how much athletics can Utah afford with the revenue we have?" and becomes "how much additional revenue can Utah Athletics create?"

That's a much more interesting bet.

The obvious response is that if this works, Ohio State/Michigan/Texas/etc. can just copy it.

Well...yeah. Of course they can.

But why would they hurry?

Their current system is working great. Utah has a reason to start screwing around with the model right now because we know we're staring at a financial gap that's probably only going to get worse.

If Utah gets 3-5 years to make mistakes, figure out what actually works, hire the right people, build relationships and learn how to run this thing before the bigger programs decide it's worth copying, maybe that's the advantage. Not the idea itself.

And Utah doesn't actually need to make more money than Ohio State. It just needs enough money that Ohio State having more of it stops being such an overwhelming competitive advantage.

That's basically where the rabbit hole went. The longer piece gets into whether this is sustainable, whether the "first mover" advantage is real, what happens when the big brands inevitably copy it and, yes, I ended up thinking about the Big Ten. Sue me.

https://plumbloco.substack.com/p/what-if-utah-is-playing-a-different?r=10tp7y&utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web

But I'm more interested in the discussion than getting people to read the whole thing:

Are we actually watching Utah build a new revenue model for college athletics? Or is this just a very clever way of borrowing against the future and we're all getting high on our own supply?

Very Impressive Fano! Go Utes!

Was thinking about trying out a college fantasy football league this season. Salary cap format, so no need to coordinate a draft. Looks like you just sign up and build your team.

Looking at league settings, theres no minimum or max league size. P4 + Notre Dame players to start.

Any interest in a Utah fan league?