San Jose State @ Utah preview

Last Meeting ( Sep 12, 2009 ) Utah 24, San Jose State 14

Utah’s Rice-Eccles Stadium will be the next stop on downtrodden San Jose State’s early season tough-luck tour against top-ranked teams. Barring some sort of catastrophic downfall, the Utes likely will have a relatively easy night’s work on their way to their 20th consecutive home victory.

The Spartans are improving and have showed impressive resolve for a team that was unanimously picked to be among the nation’s bottom feeders. First-year coach Mike MacIntyre’s tenure was destined to start with a few lopsided losses because the program agreed to be a near-automatic win for a handful of top programs. Lower-echelon teams usually earn a paycheck for their athletic departments – and a whole lot of bruises – for this willingness.

Even so, San Jose State has shown improvement. After a season-opening 48-3 drubbing at the hands of No. 1 Alabama, the Spartans held their own in the second half of a respectable 27-14 loss to Wisconsin. They will have to come with the same sort of determination to stay anywhere close to Utah (3-0), which has won 30 of 31 overall against unranked teams and is a 31-point favorite.

San Jose State (1-2), which beat Southern Utah 16-11 on Saturday, is averaging 11.0 points and will likely need to find a way to put points on the board if it wants to keep up with the Utes, who are scoring 40.3 per game. The No. 13 Utes rolled to a 56-14 win at New Mexico last week.

Perhaps the biggest concern for Utah coach Kyle Whittingham is what might be a brewing quarterback controversy. Starter Jordan Wynn has been out since he injured his thumb in the season-opening overtime win against Pitt, in which he threw for 283 yards and three touchdowns.

Wynn’s backup, Terrance Cain, has led Utah to back-to-back wins. He looked impressive in completing 20-of-23 passes for 248 yards and three touchdowns against New Mexico. He added a rushing touchdown. Cain’s production gives Whittingham the luxury of not rushing Wynn’s return, but also might put the coach in position of making a difficult decision when Wynn is ready.

Wynn has practiced some this week, and Whittingham has not yet named a starter for Saturday’s game.

"He was almost perfect on Saturday," Whittingham said of Cain. “He has played exceptionally well in two games. His pass-efficiency rating is off-the-charts good.”

Utah’s special-teams unit also has played well of late, led by returner Shaky Smithson. He leads the Mountain West Conference and ranks fourth in the nation with a 26.6-yard punt return average. He won his second consecutive Mountain West Conference special teams player of the week award after returning a punt 73 yards for a touchdown against the Lobos.