Utah Utes quarterback Cameron Rising (7) fights to maintain his steadiness on a run up the center as Utah and Florida play in Gainesvillle, Fla., on Saturday, Sept. 3, 2022. Scott G Winterton, Deseret Information
The No. 7 Utah Utes fell on the highway to open the season after Florida’s Amari Burney intercepted Utah quarterback Cameron Rising with 17 seconds left to seal a 29-26 win for the Gators.
Listed below are three takeaways from Utah’s loss:
Utah’s remaining drive comes up brief
With the sport on the road, Utah quarterback Cameron Rising guided the Utes 69 yards down the sphere in simply over a minute. However with 17 seconds left, down by three, on the Florida 6-yard line, Rising threw an interception. Burney’s choose gained the sport for the Gators as they upset the Utes.
Credit score Rising for getting the Utes to that time — although Florida dropped what appeared like a positive interception earlier within the drive — with a few key passes to Devaughn Vele and a 28-yard run on Third-and-6. It was an ideal particular person play by Burney, however with Utah in chip-shot discipline objective vary with time winding down, a turnover was the one factor the Utes couldn’t afford to have occur.
Florida’s third-quarter goal-line stand modified the sport
The Utes got here out firing to start the second half, with Tavion Thomas and Chris Curry establishing Utah’s run sport. Utah ran the ball 5 instances and Rising discovered Micah Bernard to arrange first-and-goal on the Florida 8-yard line.
The Gators’ protection made a wonderful goal-line stand, which turned out to be an enormous second in a detailed sport.
Utah had second-and-goal from the 1-yard line after a Florida penalty, however Thomas was stuffed for a lack of 2. Rising ran for two yards to arrange fourth-and-goal from the 1, however Thomas was stuffed once more.
Utah’s incapacity to attain on that drive would come again to hang-out them.
Anthony Richardson seems like the actual deal
After a so-so 2021 season the place he appeared in seven video games, threw six touchdowns and 5 interceptions, and had a 59% completion proportion, Florida quarterback Anthony Richardson seems like he has made a giant step ahead.
Richardson was 17-for-24 for 168 yards and didn’t actually make any errors. The place he actually shined was on the bottom. Richardson rushed for 104 yards and three touchdowns, together with a 45-yard landing run and the game-winning 1-yard landing run with 1:25 left.
The 6-foot-4, 232-pound sophomore evaded Utah’s protection when it counted.
Richardson made good selections just about the complete sport and made good reads, discovering opportune instances to run with the ball.