Utah Football: 3 reasons the Utes will make playoff push in 2022

1. Path to undefeated season is there

When you look at the Utah schedule, there’s a legit path to an undefeated season — at least an unbeaten campaign in the Pac-12.

The Utes begin the year with a tough road battle at Florida, but the Gators are featuring a new head coach and quarterback and could go through some growing pains early. That’s a good matchup for the Utes to take advantage of and it could prove that they’re worthy of playoff consideration early on with a big road win.

Then Southern Utah and San Diego State should be wins — the latter is a revenge game. A road battle with Arizona State once looked tough but now, not so much. Oregon State is also a revenge game the following week and at UCLA is the first tough Pac-12 battle. The Utes are the better team so I see them winning.

Utah gets USC at home which is a huge advantage against the conference’s second-best team and then there’s not really another tough game on the schedule outside of a battle in Eugene against the Ducks. The Utes got the best of Oregon twice last year and should be better again, but Autzen is not an easy place to play.

Either way, there’s a clear path to an 11-1 or 12-0 season if Utah plays to its potential.