So what does Joseph really think of the Wildcats?..

https://utah.rivals.com/news/statistically-speaking-utah-vs-arizona-2

Here’s this week’s position battles:

https://utah.rivals.com/news/position-battles-utah-vs-arizona-3

Alex caught up with Troy Hutchison with the Arizona Rivals website to talk about the Wildcats: https://utah.rivals.com/news/opponent-q-a-arizona-14

There are some interesting games happening. I'm super excited for Tennessee at Georgia - go Vols. Here's what's happening right now:

• Texas Tech is up on #7 TCU 17-13 with 5:20 left in the 3rd and TCU has the ball. I'd love to see TT upset the Horn Frogs.
• #2 Ohio State is up 14-7 over 1-7 Northwestern and they have the ball - 3:43 left in the 3rd. Northwestern was up 7-0 with about 6 minutes left in the 2nd quarter. I like OSU so much more than NW but an upset would be kind of fun.
• #17 North Carolina is up 24-21 over Virginia (they have the ball) with 3:11 left in the 3rd.

Other games of note later today:

• 3-5 Michigan State is at #16 Illinois. Will MSU right the ship or will Illinois keep winning?
• #18 Oklahoma State is at Kansas. After a 5-0 start, Kansas has lost 3 in a row and OSU is coming off a 48-0 drubbing against K-State. Which one gets to feel a little better about themselves today?
• #6 Alabama at #10 LSU - LSU is getting some respect under Brian Kelley. They got drubbed by Tennessee at home but last week they put a beat-down on #7 Ole Miss. How is this game going to play out?
• #24 Texas at #13 Kansas State. The Longhorns are favored by 3 so voters don't believe that K-State is as good as the butt-whooping they put on OSU last week (and maybe they also don't think OSU is that good). Conversely, I think that every time Texas has been ranked this year, they lost the next game - will that happen today?
• #4 Clemson at Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish have been playing a bit better as of late and they have the Tigers at home. I'm hoping they pull off the upset.
• Finally - #12 UCLA is at ASU. I think that UCLA will win this one by a comfortable margin but I wouldn't be disappointed at an upset.

What are your guys' thoughts?

Here's my look at Arizona. Could be an interesting one with the variables on Utah's offense, but being at home should help: https://utah.rivals.com/news/opponent-preview-arizona-12

Forecast is cold wind and rain. Probably favors us since they’re passing oriented offense and we’re more balanced.

This would be a good game for whoever lined up at RB to ball out.

With the Big-12 getting a new deal, what are we hearing on the PAC-12 side?

I’ll hang up and take your answer off the air.

-According to Whittingham, Rising was ready to go but had a setback early Thursday. He still expected him to go and then Cam acknowledged it wasn’t going to work. Cam had all the first-string reps that week, so it was a shock and Barnes did well with not preparing as the starter.

-Cam is progressing better than he was last week, so barring another setback, sounds like he’s good to go. If not, it sounds like Ja’Quinden would back up Barnes with a limited playbook. They believe Nate Johnson has a really bright future, but the practice reps haven’t been enough for him.

-No season-ending injuries.

-If Kincaid can’t go, it’ll be: Yassmin, McClain and Pututau. Kendall isn’t remotely the same type of TE and no mention of Landon Morris. I’m not sure if that was by accident. If Kincaid is out, it’ll be much more focused on the receivers.

-Whittingham won’t discuss Tavion. Bernard was cleared to play, but it was still early with his injury and he was ineffective. They’re happy with Glover and Whittingham just thinks he needs to learn all the finer nuances, not necessarily behind on assignments anymore. Ja’Quinden was great last week with the exception of the fumble. He really brings an added element.

-They appealed Hubert’s targeting hit, but lost, so he’ll be out the first half against Arizona. Sione Vaki has come on strong and will get more and more playing time, most likely.

-Arizona’s receivers are dangerous and they balance the offense just enough with the run. The Wildcats are similar to to passing attacks that Utah saw the last two weeks, but with less RPO.

-Whittingham was asked about the FS1 gripe and he said he was just as surprised. He mentioned they could have ran around to find them but that would have been impossible since the crew wasn’t even on site for the game. (Basically you could tell that’s why Whittingham doesn’t care about the situation)

Here’s Dustin’s in-depth look at the Wildcats… I definitely don’t think this is a game Utah can overlook…

https://utah.rivals.com/news/inside-the-numbers-arizona-4

I’ve got 4 tickets for tomorrows game that my kids won’t be using due to a school dance and birthday party. N19 Row 51. If interested, I’m selling them for whatever. I’m going to post on KSL if no one here is interested. Paid $80 per ticket (or something like that).

National Geographic lists its 25 Best Places in the world. Some are cities, some are rivers. Some.... One.... Is an entire state:

I'm going to out of town unexpectedly and will miss the STANFORD game.

I pay $471.67 per game for the 2 seats including CC donation. I'll sell them on this board for $300 (both seats). Section W11, Row 5, Seats 1&2.

Call Mark at 801-631-9901 if interested. I can transfer them to you electronically. You can pay through Venmo or PayPal

Per Twitter. Yikes!!! This isn’t good. I thought he would be a tremendous player.

Halie answers last week’s questions and looks ahead to this week’s:

https://utah.rivals.com/news/burning-questions-utes-head-into-week-9

You can definitely see the Chris Burgess effect with the bigs. Their footwork was very good, great offensive moves.
Defensively the Utes get after it.

Gus Malzahn and Brian Harsin the last two HC and will still have enough money to offer the next Coach 5 or 6 million a year.

This post is 99% TIC because I don’t think BYU fires him even if they finish 5-7 and miss a bowl game which at this point is a real possibility. I just like celebrating their misery.

They are very talent poor in Provo and it looks like the once Prodigal Son Sitake has no idea how to fix the problem

Where this is important is for potential NY6 games, so this ranking is still a big deal.

Login to view embedded media

Good new for Kincaid I hope.

Here’s Dustin’s numbers breakdown for Utah from the WSU game…

https://utah.rivals.com/news/inside-the-numbers-utah-s-pff-grades-vs-wsu

Stay tuned…

Login to view embedded media

He seems pretty upset that Whit didn't let FS1 know they were starting Barnes. As for myself FOX can go pound sand. I am still bitter about that truck racing fiasco all those years ago. And the whole broadcast last night looked more like wednesday night MACtion than the Big noon kickoff.