Utah CFB Offensive Awards: Week Four

For many across the college football landscape the first week of conference play arrived in the form of a week four match up.

Out of the six Utah D1 colleges, 3 played conference games (Utah at Oklahoma State, BYU VS K-State and Weber State at Idaho State.)

Conference games or not, all six teams took the field and the Beehive state managed to go .500 for Week Four.

The 3-3 record included a 39 point shutout win in Natchitoches, Louisiana for Weber State at Northwestern State and two major statement wins for the big boys.

Both Utah and BYU put the Big 12 on notice with impressive defeats of Big 12 favorites and ranked squads.

Utah backed up the “best of the Big 12” talk with a 22-19 win at #14 Oklahoma State in a final score that made the game seem much more competitive than it was.

BYU shed the idea that their undefeated record was a byproduct of easy teams by dismantling #13 Kansas State in a 38-9 smack down in Provo.

Both the Utes and Cougars sit at 4-0 on the season and Utah rose two spots in the AP Top 25 polls to #10, best in the Big 12 still.

BYU cracked the Top 25 for the first time this season at #22, in what feels like something few could have predicted in the off season prior.

With such big wins from Utah squads, we also got big time performances, and we are here to recognize those showings.

We start with the offense today by giving out the following:

BEST QB

BEST RB

BEST PASS CATCHER

BEST O-LINE

Reminder: We are naming the top offensive efforts from the following groups at the D1 level in Utah and Utah only.

Let’s begin.

QUARTERBACK: RICHIE MUNOZ, WEBER STATE

Let’s start this off by being frank, in an award list such as this one we can’t go off quality of opponents.

I know it’s a factor in what player truly had the best week, clearly playing a Power four school as opposed to a struggling FCS school will create a power imbalance.

But if im going to get all six schools an award here and there, one has to be content, to give out awards for carving up Houston Christian as opposed to Georgia.

Thus your weekly winner for the best QB goes to Weber State’s Richie Munoz as the Wildcats won big on the road over Northwestern State.

Munoz fits the bill as he he had the 2nd highest completion percentage in the state for QB’s who attempted more than 20 passes, going 19/31.

His 19 completions were good for about 17 yards per toss and the resulting 327 yards were the most in the state as the only passer over 300 yards.

Munoz threw for three touchdowns, once again the most in the state.

We can’t knock him too much for an interception as everyone else in the state that didn’t play for BYU or SUU threw at least one interception.

To top it all of, Munoz had a long bomb of 48 yards, the longest pass of the week for a Utah based team.

Isaac Wilson deserves a ton of credit for being a true freshman holding down the fort in a top notch tough place to play by ensuring he was more than a game manger with over 200 pass yards and 61 rush yards.

Jake Retzlaff made the most with very little opportunity as BYU’s defense and run game stole the show, still finding a way to sling two touchdowns to no interceptions on 21 attempts and a 71 percent completion percentage for 149 yards.

Spencer Petras returned to Utah State to near the 300 yard mark in a loss at Temple (293) with two touchdowns.

There were big time performances from all these guys, but Munoz checked the most boxes and takes home the win.

RUNNING BACK: MICAH BERNARD, UTAH

Targhee Lambson, a multi time winner in this category, continued his streak of games with more than 100 rushing yards with totals of 183, 149 and now 172 an and another touchdown in the T-Birds tough loss to Idaho State in Pocatello.

Utah State witnessed another strong outing from Rahsul Faison who racked up 156 ground yards and a score himself against the Owls.

But the big time outing was courtesy of Utah’s Micah Bernard who lifted the Utes offense when they needed it most.

Bernard got 25 totes, one less than Lambson and two less than Faison while rushing for a state high 183 yards.

He didn’t have the touchdown that Faison or Lambson did, but he did have the win.

Bernard burst through for a 62 yard run displaying strength and speed that would result in a Utah Field Goal, putting the Utes up 13-3 towards the tail end of the third.

That 62 yarder was the largest breakout in the state.

To top it off, despite the 25 carries Bernard was constantly moving forward with only one carry resulting a loss of yards, or should I say “yard” as it was just a -1 yard play.

His 7.3 yards per led all backs in the State, giving Bernard the best case for the best back of the week.

PASS CATCHER: SHANE CARR, SOUTHERN UTAH // JALEN ROYALS, UTAH STATE // JACOB SHARP, WEBER STATE

Three players in the state recorded more than 100 receiving yards in week four.

All three had a touchdown. (No player had more than one receiving touchdown this week for the 6 Utah D1 schools.)

As you could imagine this makes it a pretty tight race.

Jalen Royals broke through the Owls secondary for 112 yards on 10 grabs for Utah State with his touchdown.

Weber State wideout, Jacob Sharp, added to his solid season with an 8 grab, 119 yard, touchdown showing.

SUU’s Shane Carr rolled out with 7 receptions and 104 yards to pair with his touchdown snag.

Royals had a 26 yard reception as a long, averaging 11.2 yards per catch.

Sharp averaged 14.9, lets just call it 15 yards per reception with a long of 37.

Out in Pocatello, Carr had a long of 32 for, once again, 14.9 yards per catch.

All three could be winners, and because im feeling generous today, all three shall be winners.

BEST O-LINE: UTAH UTES

MICHAEL MOKOFISI, SPENCER FANO, JAREN KUMP, CALEB LOMU, TANOA TOGIAI

Utah had two of the Longest runs at 62 and 48.

The Utes had the most ground yards as a unit (282).

Utah only gave up two sacks on the freshman QB (only Utah Tech allowed less than two sacks).

It was a great contest as there were solid line performances from BYU to USU to Utah Tech.

But Utah did the dirty work with 52 rush attempts, 9 more than the 2^nd highest team by 9 run attempts (SUU) and gave their true freshman signal caller chances to be successful against a high quality opponent.

The sheer volume of work and still being able to do it at a high level gives Utah the O-line honors of week four.

That’s going to do it for Week 4 Offensive awards, and for you BYU fans who are hankering for a selection, your time will likely come in our Week 4 defensive awards after what was an elite defensive game from the Royal Blue.