Seems both Utah and UCLA are doing their part talking up the other team...
The Deseret News talks about how UCLA is taking Utah seriously in the opener.
Utah, he added, has been successful in the Mountain West Conference and is making tremendous inroads by beating very good programs and winning bowl games.
"There's no doubt this is a very, very good football team and a great challenge for our team, given our inexperience and their experience coming in," said Dorrell. "So it's going to be an exciting and great challenge for us on Saturday."
The first meeting between the Utes and Bruins since 1974 has multiple story lines. UCLA has won all seven previous contests, but Utah has won four straight over Pacific-10 opponents.
Extending the streak to five, explained Whittingham, won't be easy. The Utes have their work cut out for them.
"I think they very well could be the most athletic team we play all year long. Why wouldn't they be? They have Pac-10 facilities, Pac-10 budget, they have it all. Why wouldn't they be an outstanding football team?," said Whittingham. "We expect to see a bunch of guys out there who can really run. That's just the nature of UCLA's football team over the last couple years."
Looks like this could be turning into a contest as to which coach talks more positive about the opposing team than the other. But that's typical coach speak, always need to make your opponent look like national championships prior to the game. That way if you win, you've got a solid victory over a solid team and if you lose, well at least you talked about how good they were prior to the game.
- The Salt Lake Tribune has offered up its take on Coach Dorrell praising the Utes. He goes a step further in the Tribune article and implies that Whittingham may be a better coach than Urban Meyer. Let's not get ahead of ourselves here, Coach. Whittingham might be a good coach and could be great one day, but there is no denying what Urban Meyer accomplished in two short years at Utah. So far, a 7-5 season doesn't compare.
- Gordon Monson talks with Weddle on his new role as being team leader. Weddle just may be the best player on this year's Utah team and if he can dominate the secondary, the Utes will have a very tough defense to beat.
- The San Diego Union-Tribune has published its preseason Mountain West Conference preview. They discuss which teams are capable of leap frogging the Frogs and predict the final conference standings (Utah's 2nd).
- Nico over at Roll Bama Roll urges Tide fans to to wear nothing but crimson. He offers up a picture of the Utah/Arizona game to show how cool it looks. Either way, it's still impressive to see Bryant-Denny Stadium in mostly crimson.
- Over at Bruins Nation HomeBruin has asked the faithful to predict UCLA's record next year. They've responded with varying answers. Interesting to see that not one person thinks UCLA will lose this game, though one poster did place the game as a toss-up. However, I'd like to think if UCLA loses 6 regular season games, Utah would be capable of beating them.