Utah football: Utes' concern is Louisville, nothing else

WHITTINGHAM Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham answers questions relating to the new contract extension he has accepted to remain in his position runnig Utah's football program. A press conference was held to announce that the University of Utah has extended head coach Kyle Whittingham's contract to coach their football team, Monday, 12/29/08. Terms were said to be 6 million dollars over 5 years. Scott Sommerdorf / The Salt Lake Tribune

When Louisville and Utah agreed to a home-and-home series, the contests were thought of as a great way for the Utes to prove themselves against a quality nonconference opponent.

Now, the Utes find themselves in virtually a no-win situation Saturday against the Cardinals. If they win, the national perception will be they did what they should have done against a team picked to finish seventh in the Big East.

Lose or win unconvincingly and the game will be used as evidence that the Utes and the Mountain West Conference don't really belong in the BCS talk.

What happened to the game simply being a great West vs. East matchup or a quality nonconference opponent to get ready for conference play? Even more, what happened

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The answer is somewhere around 2004, when the Utes tasted their first BCS success then fed the BCS fervor with a repeat visit in 2008.

Utah's success in those games plus the MWC's very vocal push to become part of the BCS has seemingly both helped and harmed the conference stature.

The focus on reaching the BCS has become so great that the conference race seems almost secondary even as those breakthroughs have raised awareness of the league. If a non-BCS team loses such as Utah did at Oregon last week, the perception by some is that team's season might as well be over because chances of reaching the

Utah coach Kyle Whittingham addressed that issue this week, calling the BCS a "big monster that is consuming everybody" and explaining the Utes' main goal of winning the league still is attainable.

"If you put all your eggs in that," he said of the BCS, "then you drop a game in Week 3, 4, 5 6, what do you do? Shut it down the rest of the year? We don't take that approach."

The Utes say their focus is to use the nonconference games to prepare for conference play, which starts at CSU on Oct. 10. Gaining exposure by playing high profile nonconference opponents is secondary and the BCS is a reward, not a goal, Whittingham maintains.

"Until something changes and there is a playoff system or things are structured differently that would change my thinking, we are focused on the MWC," he said.

Yet nationally, the Utes' game against a struggling Big East program will probably draw more attention than any MWC game the Utes play, other than games against ranked opponents in TCU and BYU.

Even if the Utes win, as many expect they will since they are favored by two touchdowns, the quality of the win will be debated by the national pundits in BCS talk.

That attention might not be fair, but the Utes understand how the BCS has changed the focus of college football.

Making sure it doesn't change their focus and cause a letdown going into Saturday's game is key, they said.

"The BCS is always in the back of your mind; you can never get fully away from it," offensive lineman Zane Beadles said. "If you can, you are living in a hole. But the bigger picture has to be in front of our minds and that is to win the MWC championship and the next game at hand."

To that end, the Utes say they don't look at today's game as a must-win for conference pride, poll standings, style points or anything of that nature even if the rest of the nation does.

They want to beat the Cardinals because they merely are the next opponent on the schedule. The BCS has complicated things in the overall picture of bowls and conference strength which has led to debates and controversies, but their goals remain clear and simple.

"Fans get more excited about the BCS talk and games than we do," linebacker Stevenson Sylvester said. "That is something to look forward to, but what we look forward to and what we focus on is what is in our reach right now, this game."