Kyle Whittingham put it succinctly during his media availability this week:
“I was miserable at this point last year. Yeah, we all were,” Utah’s longtime head coach said.
Utah entered Thanksgiving week in 2024 without a ton to be grateful for, football-wise. The Utes headed into their regular-season finale in Orlando against UCF on the longest losing streak of the Kyle Whittingham era — seven games, all in Big 12 play.
Utah’s offense was a mess all season as starting quarterback Cam Rising missed the majority of the season with injury. Isaac Wilson was the Utes’ signal-caller for most of the year, and it was too much, too soon for the freshman. Longtime offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig resigned midseason and things didn’t get any better from there.
The Utes had one of the worst offenses in the country, scoring 23.6 points per game (No. 102 in the nation) and totaling just 329.8 yards per game on offense (No. 115 in the nation).
After the 2022 Rose Bowl season with Rising at the helm, Utah’s offense slipped majorly in the next two years. After 2024 mercifully came to an end for the Utes, which finished with a losing record for just the third time in the Kyle Whittingham era, Whittingham knew the offense needed to improve.
Ludwig had been in his second stint at Utah since 2019 and was successful during that time, especially when paired with Rising in 2021 and 2022. But after Ludwig’s resignation, Whittingham wanted his next offensive coordinator to have a more simple system than Ludwig’s complex, pro-style offense.
Enter Jason Beck.
Beck, a former BYU quarterback who later coached under Bronco Mendenhall in Provo and at New Mexico, had just come off of a remarkable season in Albuquerque. In the Land of Enchantment, Beck gave a boost to an offense that had scored 27.2 points per game and averaged 410.6 yards per game the year before.
Under Beck’s leadership and with quarterback Devon Dampier, the Lobos scored 33.5 points per game and ranked No. 4 nationally in total offense with 484.2 yards per game in 2024.
Would that offensive success translate to Utah?
As we approach the end of Beck’s first year in Salt Lake City, it’s safe to say it has.
Beck has delivered a stunning turnaround and engineered the best year-to-year offensive improvement at Utah since at least 1996, according to the school.
Through 11 games, Utah ranks No. 6 nationally in scoring offense (41.8 points per game), No. 6 in total yardage (484.5 yards per game) and No. 2 in rushing yardage (279.6 yards per game, above rush-heavy service academies like Army and Air Force).
Utah has scored 50-plus points four times this season and have eclipsed 40 points in all but three games.
The Utes are closing in on a school rushing record that has stood since 1984, needing 188 yards to set the record with 3,264 rushing yards on the season. The 2025 Utes, with 37 rushing touchdowns, need just two more to break the school record.
“For me personally, I love the physicality of the game and there’s nothing more that demonstrates physicality than running the football and defending the run,” Whittingham said.
There’s only been a few negatives this whole season on offense. The most glaring has been the offense’s performance in two of Utah’s “big-time” games. Utah scored only 10 points against now-No. 5 Texas Tech and put up 21 against now-No. 11 BYU.
In both games, Dampier was playing through injury, and in the BYU game specifically, a few fourth-down decisions from Whittingham heavily influenced the game. Still, the bottom line was that Utah’s offense wasn’t good enough in the two biggest games on the schedule. Those two games — BYU especially — were the only things standing in the way of a first-ever Big 12 championship game or College Football Playoff appearance.
Overall, though, you couldn’t have asked for much more than what Beck did in his debut season at Utah.
Whittingham gave his offensive coordinator high marks for the job he’s done this year.
“A-plus,” Whittingham said. “... Jason has really been a huge positive for us. And then the influx of the transfer portal guys have helped boost us as well. But again, it all starts with a solid offensive line. Jason’s done a phenomenal job this year, statistically that is borne out in the numbers as well.”
Beck coined the term “Thorterback” to refer to a do-it-all, dual-threat quarterback that had some “superhero” in him.
Dampier has been a superhero numerous times for the Utes, especially last week’s 51-47 comeback victory vs. Kansas State. The New Mexico transfer led two touchdown drives in the last seven minutes, the latter of which gave the Utes the lead for good and featured Dampier running 59 yards on fourth-and-1 to set Utah up for the game-winning touchdown.
“I mean I’ve seen him do that, so I have total confidence in putting the ball in his hand and what he’s going to do for the program. Yeah, when that fumble hit, that could have been the game right there,” Beck said. “It was right at that point where things get really hard … But just great response by everybody to battling, keep fighting and put a couple drives together to be able to pull it out.”
Dampier has played through injury numerous times this season, and while he wasn’t good enough against Texas Tech and BYU, he’s been a massive upgrade at quarterback for Utah.
Dampier has thrown for 1,927 yards and 19 touchdowns with just five interceptions on 64% accuracy. He has not been as prolific through the air as he was at New Mexico (2,768 yards last year), but he has cut down significantly on turnovers and increased his completion percentage.
The “throw game,” as Whittingham calls it, has not been as drastic of an upgrade as we thought it might be. Utah is averaging just six more passing yards per game than last season — albeit with less turnovers.
The lack of wide receiver production, save for Ryan Davis, who has 659 yards and four touchdowns this year, continues to be a bit troubling, but the focus for Beck’s offense in 2025 has been on the ground.
Beck is able to reinvent his offense to play to his team’s strengths, and this year’s strength was clearly the run game.
Led by one of the best offensive lines in Utah history, featuring projected first-round draft pick Spencer Fano, the Utes’ run game has been unstoppable in nine of 11 games this season.
“The offensive line is really the driving impetus behind that. I mean, we’ve got a really good athletic quarterback that runs the ball well. Wayshawn Parker’s come into his own, but without an offensive line that can do the things that our guys have done all year, that stuff doesn’t happen,” Whittingham said. “And so that’s a real credit to them and (offensive line coach) Jim Harding and the job he’s done with those guys.”
After a 1a and 1b situation for the first half of the year with New Mexico transfer senior NaQuari Rogers, sophomore Wayshawn Parker has taken full control of the lead running back position with four straight 100-yard games.
“It’s been awesome just to ride that every week and looking to get him 15 to 20 carries and a hundred rushing yards. He’s really doing a nice job helping us. And the other thing you may or may not notice, but he’s really blocking well on some of those runs where Byrd (Ficklin’s) scoring or we’re handing that to some other guys. He’s really blocking physically on the perimeter, so he’s really playing hard and really doing a nice job,” Beck said.
Parker has 836 rushing yards on the season, while Dampier has 637 and freshman quarterback Byrd Ficklin has 496.
Beck’s offense is built around the run-pass option, and Dampier has executed it well this year.
“My favorite part personally is just the trust level. He gives me every play out there,” Dampier said. “There’s multiple options of what I can do with the ball and he makes the plays where I get to make that best decision every play.
“And I think having that freedom, I’m always in control of our destiny and I feel like I make the best decisions on the field.”
Dampier hasn’t been the only quarterback making waves with his running ability. True freshman Ficklin has burst onto the scene in the last four games, becoming a key contributor.
Ficklin got the first start of his career against Colorado, rushing for 151 yards and a score and throwing for 140 yards and two touchdowns. In two of the next three games since, he’s played a significant role in the quarterback run game with Dampier injured.
He rushed for 166 yards and two scores in Utah’s 55-28 win over Baylor and 54 yards and three touchdowns in the win over Kansas State.
With Dampier and Ficklin, Utah’s quarterback room as a whole is in a great place. Beck has managed the room perfectly and provided Ficklin with some valuable experience in his freshman year, while still having Dampier lead the team.
“It does quite a few things for you, just in terms of anytime you can wildcat or run the quarterback, you’re getting plus-one runs, which gives you a better chance,” Beck said.
“You just only want to do so many of those with your quarterback. And so it just allows you to take some of those off of Dev because Byrd’s doing it at such a high level and every time you give him more opportunities to do things, he’s responding and making the most of it and gaining everybody’s confidence and trust. So you want to get him out there to make an impact for us and he keeps coming through. It’s awesome to see.”
If Utah is able to keep both quarterbacks next year, it’ll be a huge boon for a team that will have to rebuild its offensive line and find a new WR1 with Davis graduating, but also returns key players on that side of the ball.
In his first year at Utah, Beck has surpassed expectations and turned around Utah’s offensive fortunes. In at least a couple games this season, it’s been the offense saving the defense instead of the other way around, something that has rarely happened during Whittingham’s tenure.
That earns an A-plus from the head man.
