Utah Football: 3 takeaways from Utes’ steamrolling of the USC Trojans

The Week 8 meeting between Utah football and USC was much more one-sided than the final score indicated with the Utes dominating the game from the start.

Few could’ve expected what transpired on the field in Salt Lake City for the Utah football program on Oct. 20. Coming off a few big victories in the PAC-12 South after a slow start to the 2018 campaign, the USC Trojans were on the verge of taking hold of first place in the division standings with a quality road win over Utah.

However, the Utes had different ideas since it also had some signature wins under head coach Kyle Whittingham of late. Utah football could also stay in prime contention in the PAC-12 South with the way this game panned out for them. Both Utah and USC could be poised to stay at the top of the division standings from here on out, though.

The two early season losses for USC at the hands of the Stanford Cardinal and Texas Longhorns were set in the past with three straight victories heading into this game. Those wins came over the Washington State Cougars, Arizona Wildcats, and Colorado Buffaloes.

Meanwhile, Utah had some high profile matchups of its own of late including wins over Stanford and Arizona. Topping that all off with a win over USC would be huge for this Utah football program.

The start to this game did not go as planned for Utah, though, down 14-7 at the end of the first quarter. After that point is where the Utes really took control of the game.

Here’s a look at the three takeaways from the dominant outing for the Utah Utes in rolling over the USC Trojans.