things:

1. Jake played below what we've seen from him over the last several weeks - he looked rattled at times, he threw a few bad passes.

2. Lots of factors, including - pass pro struggled more than it has, more collapsed pockets, more instantaneous pressures, and Utah's usual heavy diet of grabbing and groping WRs in their routes.

3. In spite of the struggle his overall stats show he made enough throws to win (15 completions for 219 yards is a solid stat) and he did the one most important thing - zero turnovers. And that was huge.

4. A lot of good and great QBs have struggled mightily / been rattled against Utah. In spite of being 2-1, Max's career completion percentage against Utah was 41% and he threw two career TDs against Utah to SIX INTs. Taysom infamously was 9 of 26 against Utah in 2013. Doman was out of sorts in the first three quarters of 2001 (only two FGs and completing less than half of his passes) until the offense finally put a couple of drives together in the 4th quarter.

Upshot: as others have noted, we tend to kind of bracket "off" performances against Utah. True star turns tend to either involve veteran guys with NFL talent (Beck in 2006) or star studded casts (Jaren + Tyler + Puka + Gunner + Samson).

Jakes performance - while lackluster and erratic at times - was enough to get it done. Not unlike our one other very difficult road win at SMU, complete with the last minute drive setting up the GW FG.