Utes’ big showdown with the Ducks turns out to be MUSS ado about nothing

Everything was going great for University of Utah football on Saturday. ESPN’s “College GameDay” broadcast set up in Salt Lake City, coronating the game between the 13th-ranked Utes — riding a five-year, 18-game home win streak — and the visiting eighth-ranked Oregon Ducks as the best matchup in the nation. Thousands of fans showed up at the break of dawn in 32-degree weather to watch the announcers heap praise on Ute nation. “GameDay’s” Pat McAfee gushed to the national TV audience, “If you’ve never been here you should come. This place is beautiful!”

To pull out all the stops and further heighten its homefield advantage, the game was designated by the Utes as MUSS Appreciation Day, honoring the Mighty Utah Student Section as the most rabid in the nation. In tribute, every Ute player wore a hand-painted helmet with a MUSS logo.

It was mentioned often that the MUSS was named best student section in the country by ESPN and Taco Bell in 2021. It was mentioned often that the Utes had never lost in hand-painted helmets. It was also mentioned often that the game was Utah’s 81st sellout in a row, dating back to 2010.

But positive and promising as it all was, there was an unintended consequence: The fanfare succeeded in getting the University of Oregon’s undivided attention.

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Teams have started off hotter at Rice-Eccles, but not many, and certainly none in the last five years. The Ducks were up 7-0 after a six-play opening drive that covered 80 yards in less than three minutes. As it turned out, that’s all the points they would need in a 35-6 victory, although they kept scoring more or less at will the rest of the afternoon.

The problem wasn’t Utah’s quarterback. Bryson Barnes, the most celebrated backup in the nation — his name made its way onto some Heisman Trophy watchlists after his performance in the win against USC last weekend — was workmanlike, although his two interceptions didn’t help.

The real problem was Oregon’s quarterback. Bo Nix played like a polished pro, which technically he is, considering his $1.3 million in NIL deals. Add in the fact that this was his 55th start as a collegiate quarterback. Not only is that more starts than many NFL quarterbacks have in a career, it’s also the most in NCAA history. Nix started three seasons at Auburn and, thanks to a COVID rule granting him an extra year, the last two seasons at Oregon.

Nix came into the Utah game with the best completion percentage in the country at 78.4 and the fourth-best passer rating at 180.2. With scouts from 11 NFL teams watching from the press box, he completed 77% of his passes against Utah’s defense and graded out at 165.9 for the game. At least the Utes can say they held him below average.

On paper, honoring the vaunted MUSS in a game of such importance (with the winner staying very much alive in both conference and national championship contention; the loser facing a major if not impossible uphill climb) appeared to be a stroke of strategic genius. Painting the helmets and egging on the students should have been like throwing your pet doberman a raw T-bone.

But Oregon started out so quickly and so efficiently that the 7,000 students stuffed into the southeast corner of the stadium never had much of a chance. The students, many of whom had been up since 5 a.m. so they could get a good viewing spot at the “GameDay” broadcast (and some slept overnight on the Presidents Circle grass), were still settling into the stands and trying to find their voice when Oregon burst out of the blocks.

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The MUSS’s specialty is jumping up and down to get teams to freak out on third down. But the Third Down Jump only worked half the time — Oregon was five for 10 on third downs — and didn’t result in a single false start penalty.

The game marked the fifth straight meeting between the Utes and the Ducks with both teams nationally ranked. The string began with the Pac-12 championship game in 2019 when Oregon was ranked fifth and Utah 13th. It continued with two games in 2021, the first during the regular season when Oregon was ranked third and Utah 23rd and the second in the Pac-!2 championship game when Oregon was ranked 10th and Utah 17th. Last year, the teams met in Eugene with Utah ranked 10th and Oregon 12th.

The lowest ranked team, i.e. the underdog, won in each of those games — until the trend was reversed Saturday.

The only record Utah set Saturday was unofficial — the quietest stadium full of 53,586 fans in history. At times in the second quarter it was quieter than fall break, and it only got quieter as the stadium began to empty before the third quarter was half over. In a day that started with such potential and such promise, at the end of the game maybe 300 students remained in the MUSS. Everyone else had gone home to get some shuteye.