When it was announced last week that Utah State football had come to an agreement with Washington to play a game next season in Seattle, questions arose.
To be clear, those questions were not about why Utah State scheduled the football game.
With the move to Pac-12 next summer, Utah State has to find five nonconference opponents, and before the announcement of the game against the Huskies, the Aggies had just two games scheduled — at home against Idaho State and on the road against Utah.
Utah State needs games — it still does — and the game against Washington will pay USU $1.5 million. Add in the fact that Washington is a Western-based Power Four program, exactly the type of program Bronco Mendenhall said he hoped the Aggies would schedule going forward, and it was even better for the Aggies.
The game makes complete sense in almost every way, aside from giving USU two P4 opponents in a single season again.
No, the questions that arose after the announcement of the USU-Washington game were centered on luck and whether or not Utah State has much at all, if any.
For a large subset of Aggie fans, it feels as though USU only plays P4 teams when they are at their best, often during special seasons. This season, Utah State has played both No. 5 Texas A&M and No. 20 Vanderbilt, and there is a real argument that both teams are in the middle of the best seasons in program history, or at least the best starts to a season.
So there were jokes aplenty that Washington can look forward to being a College Football Playoff contender next season — the Huskies are 4-1 this season and ranked No. 27 in ESPN’s latest Football Power Index.
Such is the curse of the Aggies, or something like that.
But is it true? Does Utah State have the misfortune of playing P4 teams when they are on the upswing rather than catching P4 teams when they are down or underachieving?
Or is that just recency bias, with Texas A&M and Vanderbilt especially, but other teams in the recent past as well?
As it turns out, it is a little of both.
What Power Four teams has Utah State played?
Over the last 15 years, going back to the 2011 season, the Aggies have played 13 Power Four teams, many of those teams multiple times.
(For the purposes of this exercise, we aren’t counting games against Oregon State and Washington State. Additionally, games against BYU, prior to the Cougars joining the Big 12, weren’t considered, either.)
Those teams have come from across the college football landscape, too, from the SEC (Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Tennessee and Vanderbilt), the Big Ten (Wisconsin, Washington, Michigan State, Iowa and USC), the ACC (Wake Forest) and the Big 12 (Utah).
Some of those indeed were experiencing real highs when they played the Aggies.
Take LSU in 2019.
Before that season, LSU was expected to be improved (the Tigers won 10 games the year before), but few had any idea of just how improved it would be. Led by Joe Burrow, those Tigers rolled in dominant fashion to an undefeated 15-0 record and won the national title running away.
That LSU team might be the best college football team of all time. Bad luck, Aggies. What hurts more? The next year, LSU went 5-5 overall. Yes, it was the pandemic-marred 2020 season, but it wasn’t a one-off. The year after that, LSU went 6-7 and Ed Orgeron was fired.
It isn’t just LSU either.
In 2017, Utah State played the best Wisconsin team (by final record) ever. That year, the Badgers finished 13-1 and won the Orange Bowl. Led by star tailback Jonathan Taylor, the Badgers handled anyone and everyone they faced off against that year, save for only Ohio State.
The average margin of victory for Wisconsin in 2017 was nearly 20 points per game (19.85).
Similar to LSU, the year after the Aggies faced off against an elite Wisconsin team, Wisconsin was vulnerable, winning just eight games in 2018.
You can’t talk about programs peaking when they play Utah State without mentioning both Texas A&M and Vanderbilt this season.
The other Aggies are 5-0 right now, ranked No. 5 overall, and are on pace for the best season by the program since 2012, the last time Texas A&M won double-digit games.
Vanderbilt, meanwhile, at 5-1, is trending toward the best season in program history. The most wins the Commodores have racked up in a single season is nine, most recently accomplished in 2012 and 2013 under James Franklin. Vanderbilt is on pace — right now — for the first double-digit win season in program history.
The Aggies have also benefitted from playing teams at opportune times as well, though.
In 2012 and 2013, Utah was in its early days in the Pac-12 and won just five games in back-to-back seasons. The Utes had talent, sure, but not the depth to compete at the Power conference level, and it took time for them to get there.
In 2014, USU faced off against a bad Wake Forest team that won only three games. That is notable because the Demon Deacons went on — a couple of seasons later — to win seven or more games in six of seven seasons, including an 11-win campaign in 2021. Utah State did catch two of those teams, in 2017 and 2019, barely missing out on an upset in 2019.
Utah State also played a pretty mediocre Tennessee team in 2014. The Volunteers won seven games that season, but went on to win nine games in back-to-back years the next two years.
In 2015, Washington was mediocre, a seven-win team. And in 2018, Utah State played a mediocre Michigan State team that won seven games.
Last year, the Aggies caught both Utah (five wins) and USC (seven wins) in down years. It didn’t matter, as the Aggies themselves were struggling, but the Utes and Trojans were far from their best selves when they played USU.
More than anything else, though, Utah State has played good P4 schools when they are good. A challenge, sure, but not an unsurprising one.
In 2011, Auburn won eight games, a fall off from the national title run the season prior, but still, a solid season, even one of the better ones for the Tigers in the last 15 years.
Wisconsin in 2012 was an eight-win team. A good team, though not as good as the ones that preceded or followed.
USC won 10 games in both 2013 and 2016.
Wake Forest, as previously mentioned, won eight games in 2017 and 2019.
Alabama won 11 games in 2022, not the Crimson Tide at their greatest (they missed the College Football Playoff) but still a great team.
Iowa won 10 games in 2013, and Utah State was in their game against the Hawkeyes throughout, with a chance to win it in the fourth quarter.
Next season, Utah State is slated to play both Utah and Washington on the road.
It is certainly possible that both teams could be great when the Aggies play them. Right now, the Utes and Huskies are a combined 8-2 and are in the hunt in their respective conferences (Big 12 and Big Ten).
Will Utah and Washington be among the best teams in their respective histories?
Even though it might feel like it when they play the Aggies, probably not. Unless Utah State is really that unlucky.