#20 defense, why not include Mangum vs Mizzou's top 10 D? Mangum was pretty solid that game considering the circumstances. He was on the run for his life the whole game and had some big plays get called back by stupid penalties, including a 40 yd pass to Blackmon. He would have had about 300 yds and probably another TD added without penalties. He, himself did not look bad.
Boise was in the 30's and he looked good against them.
Utah State was one spot ahead of Boise and he had about 600 yds and 6 TDs combined.
He had a great 2.5 quarters against Utah's D. And what most people think of as awful while looking on paper, it's hard to say he was really really bad when one INT was a clear as day PI, and another was simply a great defensive play. It's ok for a player on one side of the ball to play well and it not mean that the person on the other side did something really bad. 315 yds and 3 TDs despite what happened in that first quarter. That's some poise and determination like we haven't seen from a Utah guy.
Just saying, it's not like Mangum hasn't played anyone. And the bigger point here is that a QB needs help. When you say "I haven't seen it from so and so." You're partly saying you haven't seen it from his OL and/or WRs as well. And at the same time, it's silly to discredit one QB for what his OL didn't help with, but then you give Williams the credit even though he had a ridiculous OL.
It was pretty amazing what he did right off a mission with a struggling OL. Plus he played a good portion of the season with a hamstring injury. Utah fields a ridiculous OL and their QB still can't do much.