What went wrong for Utah in last-second loss to No. 9 BYU?

It looked like Utah had BYU quarterback Jake Retzlaff dead to rights in the end zone on a fourth-and-10 play.
Up by two, a stop for Utah would have sealed one of the biggest shockers in this historic rivalry — an upset of the No. 9 team in the country by a 4-4 Utah squad.
But right before defensive end Logan Fano could finish the job and sack Retzlaff in the end zone, referees blew the play dead.
BYU coach Kalani Sitake had called a timeout before the snap, but due to the roar of the Rice-Eccles Stadium crowd, players — and the on-field officials — couldn’t hear the whistle.
After the timeout, the Cougars again faced fourth-and-10, their perfect season on the line, and an upset bid in the balance for the Utes.
With the crowd again at full throat, Retzlaff took the snap and was sacked by Utah linebacker Karene Reid.
The son of former BYU linebacker Spencer Reid delivering the final blow to his dad’s old team — it looked to be an incredible ending to another classic rivalry game that came down to the wire.
“I mean obviously (emotions) were high. I think we won the game,” cornerback Smith Snowden said of his emotions after the sack of Retzlaff.
But as Utah celebrated, BYU’s attention was focused on the piece of yellow cloth sitting in the secondary.
“Holding, defense, No. 5. Automatic first down” referee Kevin Mar announced. Ute cornerback Zemaiah Vaughn was called for defensive holding.
Just like in the 2012 game between the two rivals, Utah celebrated twice as if it had won the game. Unlike 2012, which saw Riley Stephenson’s kick go off the upright to secure the Ute victory, this game ended with BYU kicker Will Ferrin’s 44-yard field goal swishing through the goalposts to deliver the Cougars one of the most improbable wins in this rivalry’s history.
Immediately after the game, Utah coach Kyle Whittingham and athletic director Mark Harlan both had words for the officials on the field. Minutes later, Harlan walked into the postgame press conference room, sat down at the podium and stunned everyone.
“I’ve been an athletic director for 12 years. This game was absolutely stolen from us,” Harlan said. “We were excited about being in the Big 12, but tonight, I am not. We won this game. Someone else stole it from us. Very disappointed. I will talk to the (Big 12 Conference) commissioner. This was not fair to our team. I’m disgusted by the professionalism of the officiating crew tonight.”
When asked about the defensive holding call, Whittingham said, “I don’t want to go over those. They are what they are. They are what they are. It’s a ridiculous situation, but I’m not going to get into it.”
While fans will surely debate the defensive holding call for a while, the Utes didn’t do a lot to help themselves offensively in the second half, putting up a goose egg as they were outscored 12-0.
After turning in their best first-half performance since the Utah State game — all the way back in September — it seemed like the Utes had started to turn the corner offensively.
Quarterback Brandon Rose, who had his first career start in one of the biggest games of the season, was seemingly exactly what Utah needed. After a shaky first quarter, the sophomore quarterback found his groove, throwing for 180 yards and two touchdowns as Utah grabbed a 21-10 halftime lead.
Utah’s offensive line protected him well (he was never sacked), he was making the right reads, he made some impressive throws and he utilized his legs to great success.
But in the second half, the offensive success Utah had enjoyed vanished. The Utes gained just 78 second-half yards while BYU gained 188.
With a healthy defensive line for the first time this season and well-timed blitzes from defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley, Utah’s defense made Retzlaff’s life hard for much of the game, but Retzlaff found his groove in the third quarter, dicing up Utah’s zone defense.
On the first BYU scoring drive of the second half, the Utes held strong in the red zone to force a Cougar field goal. On the next BYU drive, Retzlaff completed passes of 32, 27 and 19 yards, and running back Hinckley Ropati converted a fourth-and-2 from Utah’s four-yard-line. Retzlaff kept it himself on the next play and found paydirt, narrowing the score to 21-19 with 12:35 left.
From that point, it was anyone’s game.
Utah had three possessions following Retzlaff’s score — the only offensive touchdown of the night for the Cougars — but got just one total first down.
On the first possession, Micah Bernard ran the ball three straight times, getting the lone first down, but getting stuffed for a loss of four on second-and-6, leading to a Rose incompletion on third down.
On the second drive, Rose threw a screen pass for a loss of one, gained two on a keeper, then threw incomplete on third-and-9.
Utah’s defense came through on the ensuing Cougar drive, sacking Retzlaff twice and forcing a punt, which gave the ball back to the Utes with 4:55 remaining.
Even after all of the offensive struggles in the second half, all the Utes had to do was pick up three or so first downs to salt the game away.
But the conservative play-calling returned.
Yes, Rose already had an interception in the game, but Utah’s offense was at its best on Saturday when Rose was playing free and given the opportunity to throw and run the ball on quarterback keepers.
In Utah’s final three drives, that didn’t happen as the Utes went heavy on Bernard running the ball.
The last drive for the Utes began with three straight runs from Bernard. The third, which was stopped for no gain on third-and-1, featured a holding penalty that backed it up 10 yards.
In the fourth quarter, Rose was pretty much only allowed to throw when Utah was behind the sticks on third down, and did so again, but only picked up four yards.
“No, no, I don’t think so,” Whittingham said when asked if he felt the play calling got conservative in the second half.
Once again, Utah punted the ball away, and that’s when the chaos started that ended in the game-winning Ferrin field goal.
In a wild game, BYU got a couple breaks, including fumbling the ball three times but recovering all three. The Cougars also had a kickoff return for a touchdown (side note: when was the last time the Utes had a kicker that could consistently kick the ball through the back of the end zone?).
And make no mistake about it, the Cougars significantly upped their play, both offensively and defensively, in the second half.
But in the end, the main problem for the Utes was the issue that has plagued them all season — an offense that couldn’t score when it mattered most.
“Offensively, we just couldn’t get the ball moving, couldn’t get down and score,” Rose said.
After playing its best first half of the season, the Utes were vying for an upset bid. Utah’s offense, which had looked anemic for four straight games, found a spark with Rose in the opening two quarters.
The sophomore quarterback delivered just what Utah had been missing for the last four games — a decent passing offense — but it didn’t start out that way.
At the end of the first quarter, Utah had passed for negative-2 yards on two passes. Rose had only thrown one pass. The other? An interception thrown by wide receiver Damien Alford on a double pass.
Alford, who hasn’t caught a pass all season and hasn’t been utilized much, took the reverse pass from Rose. With no open receiver — BYU had the play well-covered — Alford should have thrown the ball away, but he instead threw it into a crowd of BYU defenders, and Cougar cornerback Jakob Robinson was waiting for it, picking it off.
On the ensuing drive, Utah’s defense held strong in the red zone, but the Cougars were on the board first, going up 3-0 on a Ferrin field goal.
It was on the Utes’ next drive that Rose started to come alive after a slow start to the contest. Utah utilized Rose’s wheels to great success, with offensive coordinator Mike Bajakian dialing up a 27-yard quarterback keeper.
Whittingham said this week that Rose was fast, and he showed it with a couple of key runs to get Utah in the red zone.
Rose found a wide-open Brant Kuithe in the corner of the end zone for Utah’s first touchdown of the game, and the Rice-Eccles Stadium crowd exploded.
A moment later, the frenzied crowd, aside from the blue-clad fans, were brought to silence as Keelan Marion weaved his way to a 96-yard touchdown return on the kickoff. All season long, BYU’s special teams have been a plus, and it was no different on Saturday.
That huge touchdown return, which put the Cougars ahead 10-7, threatened to steal Utah’s momentum, but it ended up being the final time the Cougars scored in the first half as Utah scored 14 unanswered points to take a 21-10 lead into the locker room at halftime.
Utah was excellent on third downs in the first half, and Rose connected with Dorian Singer for a 36-yard completion on third-and-12, then found Kuithe on a later third-and-1.
The drive ended with two direct snaps to Kuithe on the goal line; the first one was stuffed, but the tight end hit paydirt on the second to regain the lead for the Utes, 14-10.
After Vaughn blew up a BYU screen pass on fourth-and-1 to force a turnover on downs and give Utah the ball at the BYU 45-yard line, Rose took advantage of a facemask and a roughing the passer call before connecting with Bernard for a seven-yard score to put Utah up 21-10 near the end of the half.
That would be the last time the Utes scored.