MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — West Virginia head coach Rich Rodriguez glanced at the stat sheet Saturday evening, moments after the Mountaineers’ 48-14 loss to Utah on rainy Saturday at Milan Puskar Stadium.
“I’m not a big stat guy, but some of them stand out,” Rodriguez said. “Disappointing and embarrassing that we didn’t execute. Nothing was very good. They didn’t punt one time, they had 33 first downs to our 14. A lot of things to fix. Coming in, I know we don’t have a big margin for error. I don’t want to say you have to play perfect, but you certainly have to play better to beat a good Utah team.”
Indeed, it was all Utes (4-1, 1-1) in their first visit to Morgantown and first regular season matchup with the Mountaineers.
Utah converted 8-of-8 third downs through the first half, scored the game’s first 35 points and did not punt while dominating from the outset.
Jaylen Henderson got his first start at quarterback for West Virginia (2-3, 0-2), but it did little to ignite an offense that again sputtered throughout the entirety of the opening half.
On five full first-half possessions (a sixth came in the final seconds of the second quarter), the Mountaineers punted three times and turned it over on downs twice.
“They showed a lot of different fronts and movements with their backers,” said WVU center Carson Lee, who started in place of the injured Landen Livingston. “They’re big, physical dudes. I played against Utah at Colorado a couple years ago. I have great respect for them. They’re always big and physical and execute very well.”
Utah, meanwhile, scored touchdowns on each of its first three possessions and all but one for the game, starting with Devon Dampier’s first of four touchdown passes on a 7-yard connection with JJ Buchanan that came on third-and-goal.
Utah converted twice on third down on its opening series and twice more on its second, which was a 65-yard drive over 11 plays that Dampier caped with his 11-yard touchdown run for a 14-0 lead with 1:33 left in the first quarter.
“Third downs are critical to get off the field and we weren’t able to do that tonight,” WVU linebacker Chase Wilson said.
The Mountaineers crossed midfield for the first time on their third possession, but it came to an end when Henderson’s pass fell incomplete on fourth-and-4 from the Utes’ 42.
Six plays later, Dampier threw a 32-yard touchdown pass to Ryan Davis that left the visitors with a 21-0 lead.
“You take whatever positive you can. There’s not a whole lot from this game,” Rodriguez said. “We weren’t as physical on the front on either side in the first half.”
That advantage looked as though it would grow shortly after when the Utes stopped Henderson and WVU tailback Tyler Jacklich short of a first down on consecutive plays with the Mountaineers needing 1 yard for a fresh set of downs. However, Dampier’s lone blemish of the contest came directly following the change of possession when his pass was intercepted by Nick Taylor on the first play.
Unfortunately for the Mountaineers, the lone turnover they forced did little to change momentum, and after punting it back to Utah, the Utes traveled 94 yards over 15 plays and got a 2-yard touchdown pass from Dampier to Dallen Bentley to lead 28-0 at halftime.
“Defensively, we couldn’t get off on third down,” Rodriguez said. “Seemed like we blew some assignments covering guys. Eye discipline was really bad. Offensively, we’re somewhat limited, but we have to come up with a plan to have success, too. Special teams, too. We put a lot of time into it. All of a sudden, we can’t kick the ball off. We have to fix that, too.”
The second half started much like the first half played out, with the Utes covering 63 yards in 10 plays and adding to their advantage with Dampier’s 11-yard touchdown pass to Wayshawn Parker. The scoring play was originally called off as Parker was ruled to have stepped out of bounds prior to the reception, but that was overturned on review.
Khalil Wilkins took over for Henderson at quarterback to start the third quarter for WVU, and the redshirt freshman led a scoring drive of 75 yards that he capped with his first career touchdown pass of 39 yards to Cam Vaughn.
Separate 33-yard field goals from Dillon Curtis allowed Utah to lead 41-7 at one point, before the teams traded fourth-quarter touchdowns.
WVU reached the end zone on Diore Hubbard’s 1-yard run that marked his first career TD. Utah backup quarterback Byrd Ficklin threw a 2-yard touchdown pass to Bryce Duke with 1:56 remaining to complete the scoring.
Dampier finished 21-for-26 with 237 yards. He also rushed for 33 yards and a score.
Parker led the Utes with 68 rushing yards and NaQuari Rogers added 61 as the visitors piled up 242 yards on the ground.
Davis led all pass-catchers with seven receptions for 107 yards.
The Utes finished with 532 total yards.
“We had played pretty consistent and played well in a lot of our games,” Rodriguez said of the WVU defense. “Today. we were leaving guys wide open, missing tackles, giving up deep balls. A couple times, we had a chance to make a play on a ball and didn’t quite do it. It was not good.”
Henderson was 3-for-7 with 22 yards and Wilkins was 3-for-6 with 63 yards as the Mountaineers completed only 6-of-13 passes for 85 yards altogether.
Jarod Bowie’s 68-yard run on WVU’s second touchdown drive allowed the Martinsburg native to be the Mountaineers’ leading rusher, while Hubbard added 61 yards on 10 attempts.
West Virginia is averaging 16.3 points in four games against FBS competition and has 17 first-half points in those contests, including three over the last two.