PROVO — A season that began with hopes of going undefeated has turned into this — BYU is now looking for a bowl victory to match the win total of the previous two seasons.
The Cougars (10-2), who got thumped by Utah, 48-24, Saturday at Rice- Eccles Stadium, can post an 11-2 record for the third straight year if they can finish off the campaign with a win in a bowl game.
In the moments after losing to the Utes, wide receiver Austin Collie reflected on the regular season, which also featured a humbling setback at TCU.
"I thought we could have done better. I thought we had the potential to go undefeated. But in the two games that we did lose, we didn't show up to play. That's what happened (Saturday)," Collie said. "Each year we want to get better. We ended up in the same spot, 10-2 (in the regular season). We didn't win the Mountain West Conference championship, and that was our main goal coming into this season. To not win it, to have two losses, and kind of find out that we're right back to where we were last year, is a little disappointing."
Said quarterback Max Hall, who threw five interceptions and had a fumble against the Utes: "We've only lost two games. In my opinion, that's a successful season. We're not the conference champs that we wanted to be. We didn't make it to a BCS game. Those were two of our goals at the beginning of the season. But I'm proud of my guys and I'm proud of the season we've had. We're going to go prepare and win a bowl game now."
Linebacker David Nixon said his team should appreciate what it has accomplished.
"There aren't many teams in the country that can say they've gone 10-2 this season," he said. "The character we've shown as a team throughout this year says a lot about our team."
BYU, which dropped to No. 20 in the Associated Press poll, No 19 in the USA Today coaches' poll and No. 18 in the BCS standings on Sunday, isn't expected to find out its bowl destination until Dec. 7.
The Las Vegas Bowl has first choice of bowl-eligible MWC teams, excluding 12-0 Utah, which is expected to receive a BCS berth. The Poinsettia Bowl has the second choice.
Coach Bronco Mendenhall said he has no preference when it comes to a bowl game.
Collie agreed. "A bowl game's a bowl game. Whatever bowl game we're in, we're going to try to learn from our mistakes and get better."
Defensive lineman Jan Jorgensen said it's imperative that the Cougars close out the season with a victory. "It's very important to get momentum rolling into your off-season so you have a lot of positives to build off of. For us to be successful and reach our goals, it's very important for us to win this bowl game and carry on the momentum into the off-season and prepare for next year."
The Cougars are scheduled to hold a team meeting today, then they'll get the remainder of the week off for Thanksgiving. They will reconvene next Monday to resume practices.
"We still have a bowl game ahead of us," Nixon said. "We'll rebound like we did after TCU. We'll go out and play hard."
BYU players expressed their support of Hall, who had thrown eight interceptions in 11 games before throwing five picks against the Utes.
"It's not his fault that we lost. We're all behind Max," Jorgensen said. "We all have his back. He's our leader. He's our captain. We're going to live and die with him. We're all behind him and he knows that. He knows that we're going to fight with him until the end."
Hall said he will learn from the losses to TCU and Utah.
"Both TCU and Utah did a very good job of finding ways to limit our offense. We moved the ball well, but they found ways to make us turn it over. I think I can look at that on film and learn from it. I think I'm doing a very good job, but I still have a lot of things to learn if I want to be a great quarterback and a great leader on this team. Luckily, I have one more shot at these guys next year. I'm looking forward to it."
It may take a while for the sting of those two painful conference defeats to wear off, though.
"Losing to Utah doesn't put a damper on the season," Jorgensen said. "It's the fact that we weren't able to meet our goals of winning a conference championship and having an opportunity to go to a BCS bowl game. That's what hurts."
E-mail: jeffc@desnews.com