Utah Football: Why can’t Utes take over Pac-12 recruiting?

Despite their recent success both in and beyond the Pac-12 Conference, the Utah Utes are not the most attractive to recruits. Why is this?

Salt Lake City, Utah seems to have it all for the young, hip crowd: beautiful scenery, a good climate (typically), and a darn good university. And with that university comes one dangerous football team.

The University of Utah football program has been one of the best that the Pac-12 Conference has had to offer over the past several years. In the last 10 seasons, the Utes have averaged just under eight wins a year, having avoided a losing record ever since 2013.

In this stretch of time, they have cemented themselves as an NFL factory. This was mainly evident in the 2017 and 2020 NFL drafts, as eight and seven Utes were taken during them, respectively.

Utah Football’s veteran head coach Kyle Whittingham has received a tremendous amount of praise for this, as his reputation as an HC has been built upon his ability to consistently craft NFL-caliber talents out of lower-rated recruits.

Most recently, the Utes reminded the college football world that they will not be going anywhere and, if anything will only be climbing the CFB ladder even further than they already have (winning the Pac-12 title and going toe-to-toe in the Rose Bowl with Ohio State was an effective way to do so).

As for future schedules, the Pac-12 South power has already lined up home-and-home meetings with both the Florida Gators and Baylor Bears (all of which will be played in the next three seasons). So to believe that Utah football will be losing any of their current spotlight anytime soon is far-fetched, to say the least.

So to summarize, the University of Utah is a solid school–both academically and athletically–in a beautiful location that has a football program with a stable head coaching situation, a reputation for being an alleyway to the NFL, and primetime-level games on the horizon.

How does all of that equate to the Utes continuously failing to take the Pac-12 recruiting game by storm?

No common explanation can answer this question

Today, the Utah Utes sit at 4th place in the 2022 Pac-12 recruiting rankings, which is actually higher than what they’re used to. They are currently behind Oregon, Arizona, and Stanford–ascending order. Calling that list head-scratching would be a hefty understatement.

The reasoning for such a dilemma can’t be because of program quality, as none of those aforementioned teams were anywhere near as good as Utah last year. That is especially the case for Arizona, as the Wildcats saw a frightening 1-11 record in 2021.

The blame can’t fall on academic standards, either, as the Stanford Cardinal–who are leading the Pac-12 in football recruiting–have some of the strictest academic standards in the country.

It also most likely isn’t head coach Kyle Whittingham, as he holds a good image when it comes to the relationships that he has with his players. And again, he is renowned for building his talent up to the NFL level better than most others can.

Will a lack of change regarding the Utes recruiting situation harm them? To a degree, as they are making a point to soon face some of the bigger fish in the CFB pond. However, their tendency to make do with what they have won’t just disappear after yet another underwhelming offseason.

It does make one think, though: if the Utes can win the Pac-12 and come close to downing Ohio State in the Rose Bowl with so-so recruiting, what all could happen if they had just a portion of the nation’s top talent? At this rate, it appears as if no one will ever know.