UCLA Football Preview: Entire Utah Coaching Staff from Last Season Is Back
The Utes' punting game has improved significantly from last season.
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As I sat down to start writing our preview of the Utah coaching staff and special teams, I remembered how last year I wrote about the overall stability of the Utah coaching staff.
To be honest, I thought about just updating what I wrote last year about the Utah coaching staff. To a degree, I’m going to do just that.
Why? Because Utah’s coaching staff is the same as last season, at least as far as the coordinators and even the position coaches are concerned.
Head coach Kyle Whittingham is the second-longest tenured coach in the FBS. Only Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz has been at his current school longer. He is now in his 19th season with the Utes.
Whittingham’s coordinators haven’t changed since last season either. Defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley is now in his 16th season with the Utes and his eighth in charge of the defense. Andy Ludwig remains in charge of the offense for his fifth season with the team.
In fact, none of Whittingham’s coaches from last season left the school. Each of his position coaches are the same as last year.
That kind of coaching stability has been a trademark of the Utes. The team is consistenly well-coached and Whittingham’s assistants remain loyal from one year to the next.
It’s a big reason why Utah is the two-time defending Pac-12 Champions.
Special Teams
Punting is another area where Utah is consistent. Jack Bouwmeester returns for another season with the Utes. Last season was a pretty average season for Bouwmeester. In fact, his punting average for the season was just 39.2 yards per punt.
But the Australian has really improved this season. His punting average has increased to 48.8 yards per punt and he has already set a new career long at 64 yards, blowing away last season’s long of just 52 yards. He’s also blown away the number of punts he had last year over 50 yards. Last year, he kicked just the one 52-yarder. Already this year, Bouwmeester has six punts longer than 50 yards. He has also increased the number of punts landing inside the 20. After 16 punts last season, only three were inside the 20. This year, 7 of his 13 punts have done that. Last year, I wrote, “Bouwmeester hasn’t proven to another great Aussie punter so far.” Well, this season, he is living up to that potential. So, if the Bruins force the Utah offense to punt, UCLA will almost certainly start off from less-than-desirable field position.
The rest of the Ute special teams is different from last season.
Last year’s kicker Jordan Noyes transferred to Colorado State while kickoff specialist Jadon Redding is no longer on the team either. Instead, junior Cole Becker will handle the field goal and PAT duties. Becker has made both of his attempts under 50 yards. His long so far is 51 yards while he missed an attempt from 55 yards. Redshirt freshman Joey Cheek has made the only field goal he tried from 37 yards.
Becker has also kicked off the majority of the time for the Utes as well. He’s kicked off ten times with six of them going for touchbacks. While Cheek is listed second on the depth chart, senior Chase Carter is the only other kickoff specialist. He kicked off six times against Weber State. I don’t think Bruin fans will see much of him this week.
Senior receiver Mycah Pittman has returned five of the kickoffs the Utes have recieved for a total of 33 yards, but 26 of those yards came on his longest return of the year. Freshman receiver Mikey Matthews hasn’t done any better. He has three returns for nine yards and his long accounts for eight of them.
Matthews has also accounted for the bulk of the team’s punt returns. He’s returned three punts for 77 yards and his longest went for 29 yards. Sophomore safety Sione Vaki has returned one punt for 16 yards.
Go Bruins!!!
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