One of the most consequential plays of Utah’s football season didn’t occur in a game.
Two weeks before the Utes’ home opener, potential starting quarterback Brandon Rose dropped back and was blasted head-on by a Utah defender. He was hospitalized with an undisclosed injury and ended up never playing a snap during the season.
The Utes eventually limped to an 8-5 record, hindered as they shuffled from backup quarterback to backup quarterback.
Utah could have used Rose last year. Instead, he never saw the field because quarterbacks went live — in other words, allowed to be hit — in practice.
This spring, head coach Kyle Whittingham has been clear: Don’t lay a finger on the QB.
But is this an evolution in approach for the notoriously defensive-minded coach, or just a one-time reprieve?
“We didn’t feel this spring was the time to make guys battling for No. 2 [quarterback] live,” Whittingham said. “There may be some sessions in fall camp where they are live.”
Whittingham has made it a priority to get the quarterback room healthy again. He can’t afford another quarterback injury, not with the depth even thinner this year.
Veteran Cam Rising is coming off a knee injury. Behind him are Rose and freshman Isaac Wilson, neither of whom has played a collegiate snap. Utah might go after a transfer portal quarterback to add more options.
In the meantime, Whittingham has had to sacrifice some live hitting in spring.
But even if this isn’t a wholesale philosophy change, the coach is open to the debate about how much quarterbacks should be live. He says he reviews the practice every year.
“It is a year-to-year thing. Depending on the situation with the quarterback battle,” Whittingham said. “If you have a really tight battle going on and you need to find out if a quarterback can extend play, what kind of escapability he has under fire, then at times we will make the quarterback live.”
He doesn’t need to do that with this group. Rising is a seventh-year player and a known entity.
“We obviously know what Cam Rising can do,” he said. “There may be some sessions in fall camp where [backups] are live. But never Cam, not until he lines up against Southern Utah” for the first game of the season.
When the spring game comes around on Saturday, the quarterbacks in yellow jerseys will be a welcome sign for some Utah fans. For most, the thought of Rose’s fall camp injury is still at the forefront of a failed 2023 season.
For now, he is keeping everyone — especially his QBs — happy and healthy.
“The quarterbacks haven’t been live all spring,” Whittingham said. “And they won’t be live on Saturday.”
