SAN FRANCISCO — At this point you have to wonder who would want to play the Utes in a bowl game anyway.
As Dirty Harry Callahan used to say in his glory days, go ahead, make their day. Make their season, too. Four months after the season-opener, this much is clear: The Utes don't attend bowl games for the buffet.
Thursday they made a Ramblin' Wreck of Georgia Tech, claiming a 38-10 Emerald Bowl win.
Memo to anyone planning to play the Utes in the future: Don't schedule them in December. Once it gets around holiday time, they're as hard to bring down as Dirty Harry himself. Utah now has won five consecutive bowl games, including the last three by a combined score of 90-17. It has allowed just 23 points in its last four bowl games.
How tough are the Utes? Even with under five minutes remaining — and everyone gone from the Tech rooting section except the bus driver — the Utes stopped the Yellow Jackets on fourth-and-one at the Utah 25.
They wouldn't even allow a sympathy score.
As one Utah fan noted on a hand-written sign, "The Lights Are Out in Georgia."
"(Georgia Tech) quit on us," receiver Travis LaTendresse said. "They really quit. They came out and were talking it up and then it died down. They gave up."
It's becoming a familiar pattern. Initially there is trash talk, then realization and finally despair.
"We saw it against Pitt, we saw it a few years ago against SC, we saw it in the Southern Miss game. That's what you've got to do is make teams quit," LaTendresse said.
Right. But how? By overwhelming them. LaTendresse's 16 catches, four touchdowns and 214 receiving yards were Emerald Bowl records. Ditto for his 26 points scored. His four scoring catches tied an NCAA bowl mark.
Utah set 18 Emerald Bowl records.
Did we leave anything out? Oh, yes, the work. The Utes must be setting some sort of record in that area, too.
"I want to tell you, last week was camp," LaTendresse said. "We were going 8 a.m. to 6 p.m."
It goes like this: The Utes get invited to a bowl game against a team from a bigger, more prominent conference. But when game day rolls around, the Utes are on them like a tattoo. They have now beaten Fresno State, Southern California, Southern Mississippi, Pittsburgh and Georgia Tech consecutively.
They may look like any other team on bowl week, mixing vacation and work, but they play like they've been harboring ill will for years. Maybe they have.
Often they're the underdog, as they were in 1994 against Arizona, 2001 against USC and again this year against Georgia Tech. It's probably true that opponents don't take the Utes seriously. Which is understandable. It took Utah 46 years to earn its first bowl invitation. Through 1991, the Utes had only played in four bowl games. Their postseason trips came around as often as Halley's Comet.
But then they started appearing regularly — three in a row from 1992 to 1994, again in '96, '99 and 2001.
Along the way, they discovered vacations are fine but winning is finer.
"ACC, Pac-10, whoever it is, we go into the games expecting to win," defensive coordinator Gary Andersen said.
Thus they arrived in San Francisco on Christmas night this year with a to-do list as long as the drive to Tahoe.
They did attend the obligatory banquet and tour Alcatraz, even catching a bit of sightseeing. But by the time the game rolled around, they were all business, piecing together a 76-yard scoring drive on the first possession. Quickly the lead was 20-0.
"Georgia Tech didn't take us seriously. I don't think they did. They learned a lesson today," center Jesse Boone said.
As for anyone looking to play the Utes in the future, perhaps it's best to again reference Dirty Harry, who upon cornering a criminal with his .44 Magnum, said, "You've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya punk?"
E-mail: rock@desnews.com