What Utah's Kyle Whittingham said ahead of Week 5

Utes look to move past blowout loss to Texas Tech as they prepare for the Mountaineers

Utah Utes head coach Kyle Whittingham and his program take on the West Virginia Mountaineers in Morgantown, West Virginia. | Rob Gray-Imagn Images

Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham hasn't been to Morgantown, West Virginia, before, making Saturday's trip out east to take on the Mountaineers a first for the 65-year-old California native.

"I understand it's a great place to play, and they get great crowds," Whittingham said during his weekly press conference on Monday. "I guess [Milan Puskar Stadium] holds about [60,000 people], and they're getting close to that."

With kickoff between the Utes and Mountaineers set for 3:30 p.m. local time, Whittingham said they'll be rolling out of Salt Lake City on Thursday night — a bit earlier than if the game were set for later in the afternoon.

Coming off a 34-10 defeat to Texas Tech, the Utes probably don't mind having an expedited travel schedule.

"We got to bounce back," Whittingham said. "You lick your wounds for 24 hours, and then it's time to get back after it and put your head down and go to work."

Here's more from Whittingham's weekly press conference.

On Devon Dampier's health status during Texas Tech game, whether there are long-term concerns

"He's doing the best he could. [He] wasn't able to practice Tuesday or Wednesday; a little bit Thursday. I'm gonna tell you that it definitely impacted Devon. But if you're out there, you gotta get it done, and so we never use that as an excuse."

Sep 20, 2025; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; Utah Utes quarterback Devon Dampier (4) warms up before the game against the Texas Tech Red Raiders at Rice-Eccles Stadium. | Rob Gray-Imagn Images

"We hope [the injury doesn't have long-term ramifications]. But again, we never discuss injuries here; other than the injury report. So, we'll just have to see how it goes. I think he's in a better place — well, I know he's in a better place right now on Monday than he was last Monday — so that bodes well."

On whether he's confident the team won't 'spiral' like last season's squad did after 4-0 start

"Very confident that this team is not going to allow that to happen. That's just their attitude. They're competitive. Last year's team was competitive too and had a great attitude, but we've got a lot of things going for us. We just had an off day offensively. And again, Texas Tech had a great deal to do with that, as I mentioned."

"We got really good leadership on this team; just got to keep people healthy. And that was really the situation last year, and so assuming that we won't have a run of bad luck like we did then, we'll be back. I mean, everyone you play on a Saturday — what 200 teams play, or however many there are — and half of them lose, and you got to be able to handle it and bounce back. That's what the situation we're in."

On why Utah's passing game lacked explosiveness

"It wasn't the game plan. We hit [Jackson] Bennee on the one, and, of course, got it called back; so that was one. We had Tobias Merriweather wide open on one and missed the throw partially. Their coverage negated a lot of the opportunities as well. They were in good position most of the time. Ryan Davis did, like you said, had another good day with his possession-type receptions."

"But I've said it before, we've got to be able to do a better job of pushing the ball down the field and and we had some some things dialed up, but between the penalty and overthrow and just not connecting on a couple — we also got a [pass interference] in our favor on one of the deep shots — but we got to do better at that. That's one of the, if you were to say what is lacking in the offense right now, that's probably at the top of the list."

On Utah's missed tackles, Texas Tech's quarterback

"We had our worst tackling day; 23 missed tackles, which for us is way too many — more than double than what we should have. They had some really good backs. I know their top back is out for the season, I guess, but the backs that did play were good and created some of those missed tackles."

Sep 20, 2025; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; Texas Tech Red Raiders quarterback Behren Morton (2) passes the ball against the Utah Utes during the first quarter at Rice-Eccles Stadium. | Rob Gray-Imagn Images

"By the way, I was really impressed with their backup quarterback. He's a heck of a player; probably wish the starter would have never gone out, but he's a good player too. The backup came in and really did some damage on us."

"That tackling is something that we pride ourselves on. We work on it every week; this week would be no different, and we were very sloppy in that regard last week."

On what he expects from West Virginia coming off a blowout loss

"Rich [Rodriguez] is a really good offensive coach, he's got great schemes. They've been a little bit of musical chairs with the quarterback; they played three of them in the Kansas game, and so I think that they're still not quite settled on the quarterback. And then their top back didn't play against Kansas last week; the big kid, No. 2 (Tye Edwards), I think it is.

We faced [Rodriguez] plenty of times; not only at Arizona, when he was at Michigan, and so we know what he brings to the table offensively. And we're gonna have our hands full, and ... they'll be fired up. They're coming off a loss like us, and when you're coming off a loss, you're hungry, and so we're gonna get their best shot."