Utah News

Two Utah political strategists say they were inundated with texts from concerned friends after Kevin O’Leary publicly accused critics of his massive Utah data center project of having ties to the Chinese Communist Party (1).

Gabi Finlayson and Jackie Morgan, co-founders of Elevate Strategies (2), found themselves at the center of a firestorm after O’Leary made the remarks during a segment on Fox Business. The pair, who have worked on Democratic campaigns and run Elevate Utah — a political content platform where they’ve publicly opposed the proposed Stratos Project — said they were blindsided by the allegations.

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“These are proxies for the Chinese government, is my argument, and if they’re not — because I want them to be able to defend their names,” O’Leary said. “Come out, come out wherever you are.”

The debate stems from a proposed 40,000-acre artificial intelligence data center development in Box Elder County’s Hansel Valley that is projected to be more than twice as large as Manhattan (3).

Why communities are pushing back

Rather than backing down after being called out, Finlayson and Morgan responded to O’Leary with a sense of humor. The two took to social media and turned O’Leary into the punchline, teasing his recognizable habit of wearing flip-flops with a suit during television appearances (4).

“The only foreign operative here is a Canadian wealthy person trying to ruin our state,” Finlayson told Business Insider (1).

Still, the exchange points to a much larger issue playing out in communities across the country. Public skepticism around AI data centers is mounting, with seven in 10 Americans saying they oppose having artificial intelligence facilities built in their local area, according to Gallup (5).

Similar to Finlayson and Morgan, residents have voiced concerns over how these projects could affect water resources, raise utility costs and change the character of their communities.

Those concerns may feel especially relevant in Utah, where electricity prices have already risen. Residential power costs in the state increased 15.2% between May 2024 and May 2025 — the third-largest jump nationwide, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (6). Across the U.S., electricity prices increased by about 6.5% during the same period.

Concerns around resource use have also drawn attention from state leaders. Utah Governor Spencer Cox said in a post on X that he requested the project developer release a public water plan showing the development would not harm the Great Salt Lake (7) . He added that water use should be publicly reported and said the project should not reduce water flowing into the lake.

O’Leary’s team pushes back on criticism

O’Leary did not respond to Business Insider’s request for comment, but Paul Palandjian, CEO of O’Leary Ventures, clarified the company’s position.

According to Palandjian, the firm is not alleging that any particular individual is acting as a foreign operative and instead wants more transparency around who is financially backing opposition efforts tied to the project.

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“To be clear about Elevate: We accept that Elevate’s principals are American political strategists. We are not contesting that,” Palandjian told Business Insider (1). “What we have asked, and continue to ask, is for full donor transparency from the organizations that are funding the opposition to this project.”

Palandjian said the company recognizes the concerns being raised by residents and emphasized what O’Leary Ventures sees as the project’s economic upside. He estimates the development may generate roughly 4,000 construction jobs during its 10- to 15-year buildout.

O’Leary has also suggested that some of the pushback surrounding data centers stems from perceptions that no longer reflect how the industry has changed (8). He argued that the technology and energy systems supporting these facilities have progressed considerably and said he hopes the Utah project can serve as an example of responsible development.

Even as companies highlight the potential benefits of data center projects, questions around their environmental footprint have become more common as AI infrastructure rapidly expands. Some large facilities can use up to five-million gallons of water daily — an amount comparable to the needs of a town of roughly 10,000 to 50,000 residents (9).

The bigger question around AI’s growth

According to a Brookings analysis, the rise of AI is leading to a boom in data center construction (10), with tech companies saying these projects can bring jobs and more tax revenue to communities.

But researchers say many residents and policymakers are becoming worried about the strain large facilities could put on local power grids and electricity costs. With many households already feeling squeezed by rising expenses, Brookings noted that growing energy demand from data centers could add even more pressure and raise questions about who ends up paying the price.

Still, O’Leary argues his Utah project will be different. In a video posted on Facebook, he said his background gives him a unique perspective (11), describing himself as the only data-center developer with a degree in environmental studies.

“We want it to be the shining example of how you do this,” he said. Whether residents buy into that vision remains an open question.

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Business Insider (1), (8); TikTok (2); The Verge (3); Google (4); Gallup (5); Axios (6); X (7); Environmental and Energy Study Institute (9); Brookings Institution (10); Facebook (11).

This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.

“I’d probably get paid a lot more if I was” spying for China, one of O’Leary’s targets replied.Mother Jones illustration; imageSPACE/Zuma

Utah political consultant Gabi Finlayson was driving out of a canyon last week when she got the news that she had been accused of being a Chinese government operative. 

She was driving to a speaking engagement in central Utah with her colleague, Jackie Morgan. When their car climbed out of the canyon and back into cell service, their phones were going off. 

“Jackie and I each had like five text messages saying, you know, are you okay, did you see this, it’s gonna get worse before it gets better, but just hang in there.” They weren’t sure what happened, Finlayson said, until someone sent them the video. 

Kevin O’Leary, the Shark Tank billionaire investor trying to build a 40,000-acre data center campus in Finlayson and Morgan’s home state, had gone on Fox News. His “guys” had done a “deep dig into the IP addresses,” he said, and found “two cells inside of Utah” affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party: Finlayson and Morgan’s group, Elevate Strategies, as well as the nonprofit Alliance for a Better Utah. 

Finlayson and Morgan call the claim an out-and-out lie motivated by their opposition to a controversial Utah data center. “You don’t wake up in the morning often thinking, like, maybe I’ll get accused of sedition today on Fox News by Kevin O’Leary, but here we are,” Finlayson told me. “I’d probably get paid a lot more if I was” being paid by a foreign government, Elizabeth Huntchings, of Alliance for a Better Utah, told Fox News. 

They spoke against the Stratos data center not because they’re being paid to do so, Finlayson said, but because it seemed like something that had been “very much imposed upon people”—a massive construction project undertaken with very little public knowledge, that could increase Utah’s net greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent, as one University of Utah professor estimates. 

To O’Leary, though, red spooks are the only reasonable explanation. “Who would want us to stop building our electrical grid? Who would want to stop us from having the compute capacity to develop AI? Which adversary would want that? There’s only one, it’s China,” O’Leary told Fox Business News host Maria Bartiromo earlier this month. 

This narrative—that hyperscale data centers like O’Leary’s in Utah must be built, as a matter of national security—echoes a 2025 executive order by Donald Trump accelerating the federal permit process for data centers. And more and more data center investors are picking it up—insisting that their projects must be built in order to out-compute China. 

“It is a national security imperative for the United States to achieve and maintain unquestioned and unchallenged global technological dominance,” Trump wrote in his 2025 executive order. (The president has also invested millions of dollars in companies that build data center infrastructure.) 

But Finlayson and Morgan, in Utah, spend their working lives support local Democratic political campaigns—often a long shot in a Republican supermajority state—andrun a Substack on local news and politics. It’s an affiliation that may not endear them to O’Leary, who says he will provide proof, still to come, that his critics are foreign operatives; he has as yet not done so. His investment firm did not respond to multiple requests for comment. 

Finlayson says she’s part of a wave of real, unpaid outrage among Utahns. “Almost everyone in the entire state is so mad about this,” she said. “There’s obviously the folks that are concerned about the environmental impacts—I mean, it’s the largest proposed data center in the entire country—but then also you have a lot of more conservative people that are ranchers and farmers, people that live in these rural areas, that don’t want this infrastructure.” The backlash against data center construction has been called the “most bipartisan issue since beer”—and in Utah, that shows. 

In the west, Finlayson said, “we kind of have this libertarian streak”: her community does not take well to “investors and rich people wanting to come in and just impose this thing on people without really significant community input.” In effect, she said,  “the government is telling you what to do, and they’re not interested in having any feedback.” 

Utahns have given O’Leary and the data center’s other developers quite a lot of feedback. Hundreds showed up to protest at a Box Elder County commission meeting where the data center was approved earlier this month, and thousands of people filed formal protests against the data center’s water rights applications. 

While it’s not clear that overturning the county commission’s approval would stop the data center’s construction—it has already been approved by Utah’s Military Installation Development Authority, a powerful state agency—one Box Elder County group wants to put the project on the ballot for a voter referendum. 

Caving to public pressure, the Utah legislature announced Wednesday that it will study the impacts of the proposed data center on the ever-shrinking Great Salt Lake’s water—a timely move, as Utah declared a statewide drought emergency this week. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, has publicly acknowledged that the rollout of O’Leary’s Stratos data center “was not good.” And more protests against the project are scheduled to descend on the Utah State Capitol during Memorial Day weekend. 

Finlayson is heartened by the pushback. “This is not about where you fall in the political spectrum, it’s about who has power to make decisions over your life and who doesn’t,” she said.  “Oftentimes, it feels like we don’t get to decide what happens to us, and we’re just getting things imposed on us by the government or by the wealthy.” 

In Republican-supermajority Utah, she said, this kind of alliance-building means a great deal. “I think that people that have had money and have had power for a long time forget what it looks like when real people have a real problem with a real issue, and they really push back.”

This article was first published in the Ute Insiders newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Wednesday night.

For years under longtime offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig, Utah didn’t have a dedicated quarterbacks coach, as Ludwig took on the dual roles himself during much of his second stint at Utah.

That changed with Jason Beck, who brought Koy Detmer Jr. with him from New Mexico in an analyst role that also had him spend time coaching the quarterbacks.

When Kevin McGiven took over as Utah’s offensive coordinator this winter, it didn’t take long for him to hire a quarterbacks coach, adding Ryan Gunderson to his staff about five days after he was hired to run Utah’s offense. Though McGiven has coached quarterbacks at various stops in his career, including at Oregon State and Utah State, and will certainly give his expertise to Devon Dampier and Byrd Ficklin, he also brought in Gunderson to be a dedicated quarterbacks coach.

“He’s a good one, man. I’ve gone against him. So we were in the Rose Bowl playing UCLA and DTR was up and down the field on us and Ryan was a big part of that. So (he) brings a ton of experience, but he’s also a pretty good calming influence for those guys when stuff’s hitting the fan. He’s a very good teacher and you can ask those quarterbacks.”

—  Utah head coach Morgan Scalley on Utah QBs coach Ryan Gunderson

A career backup quarterback at Oregon State, Gunderson broke into the coaching world under Mike Riley as a graduate assistant and eventually shifted into a director of player personnel role and followed Riley to Nebraska.

From there, he moved into on-field coaching as San Jose State’s quarterback coach in 2017 and linked up with McGiven, who became the Spartans’ offensive coordinator in 2018. The two formed a successful partnership, with Gunderson named a nominee for the 2019 Broyles Award after the Spartans threw for 338 yards per game, fourth nationally.

He also brings two years of offensive coordinator experience, though Oregon State’s offense during his stint there during the 2024 and 2025 seasons never rose above 95th in the nation in points per game.

Gunderson also had a stop from 2021-2023 as the quarterbacks coach at UCLA, helping develop Dorian Thompson-Robinson. Gunderson’s work in Westwood caught Morgan Scalley’s eye, especially in a 42-32 loss in which Thompson-Robinson passed for 299 yards and four touchdowns.

“He’s a good one, man. I’ve gone against him. So we were in the Rose Bowl playing UCLA and DTR was up and down the field on us and Ryan was a big part of that. So (he) brings a ton of experience, but he’s also a pretty good calming influence for those guys when stuff’s hitting the fan. He’s a very good teacher and you can ask those quarterbacks,” Scalley said.

One point of emphasis from McGiven and Gunderson this spring was improving each quarterback’s pre-snap reads and post-snap progressions in order to be more efficient and make better decisions.

“There’s certain guys that are going to count to four or five and they’re going to go boom, boom, they’re going to scan the whole field. We want to give them tools to where they don’t have to count that high every time. They can simplify or cut down the progression,” Gunderson said.

One of the key points that Gunderson has instilled into his quarterbacks is “play slow pre-snap, you can play fast post-snap.”

“Giving them tools to cancel things out pre-snap is what we’ve focused on a lot,” Gunderson said. “We’ve asked them at times to read the full field, but there’s different types of progressions. So it’s not always as simple as just saying, ‘No, no, no, yes.’ Getting them used to what those different progressions are, when to use them, when not to use them.”

While Gunderson and the rest of Utah’s offensive staff are trying to develop Dampier and Ficklin into more complete quarterbacks, they also are acutely aware of what makes each of them great, and a big part of that is their running and playmaking ability.

“I understand that there’s a playmaking ability to both of them. The sequence for me is you need to make the play. So if we call a play and it’s the coverage that we wanted, I need you to hit that throw,” Gunderson said. “Then after you make the play, you make a play. There’s going to be opportunities that come about where I need you to go make a play. Then when the defense makes a good call or gets us in a situation we don’t want to be in, don’t make a bad play worse.”

This spring, there was a focus on Dampier and Ficklin playing within the confines of the offense — which is tailored to their strengths — with the expectation that things will be different in game situations.

“I think we all understand that when the games come around, there’s a different element to them. You want the wild mustang to be a wild mustang, but we also want to kind of keep them on that path,” Gunderson said. “So don’t take the playmaker out of the playmaker, and that’s kind of my goal. You got to let them play a little bit too.”

The reviews from Dampier and Ficklin on what Gunderson has meant to their development have been positive.

“Huge development, honestly. Every day I feel like I’m actually learning something every single day. He’s very hard on me,” Dampier said. “He wants me to be great. He asks me all the time, ‘Do you want to be in the NFL?’ And I answer yes. So he tells me I got to get better. I got to fix these corrections. He’s been a huge help. I feel like I took a lot of strides this spring and looking forward to the fall.”

Ficklin has also seen improvement as he moves into his sophomore season after a freshman campaign that saw him contribute a lot for the Utes.

“Coach Gundy has been a really big part, whether that be full-field progressions to get the ball out of my hand quick to just knowing coverages,” Ficklin said. “He’s been teaching me a lot and that’s a big thing I really like about coach Gundy. He’s a really, really smart football player. He might’ve been a pocket passer back in his day, but that’s also really helping me to be a better quarterback as well.”

As Utah heads toward the 2026 season, it will need its quarterbacks to keep making strides, and Gunderson will be a big part of facilitating that.

In case you missed it

After a season-ending injury, Rabbit Evans is armed with a different perspective as he returns to lead Utah’s safeties.

From the archives

Extra points

OREM, Utah, May 22, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Utah Valley University (UVU) is pleased to announce the appointment of Spencer Magleby, Ph.D., as dean of the Smith College of Engineering and Technology (SCET), effective June 16, 2026.

Magleby brings extensive experience in academic administration, curriculum innovation, and institutional leadership. He is a professor emeritus of mechanical engineering at Brigham Young University (BYU) and served in key leadership roles, including associate dean and director of the BYU Honors Program, with a strong focus on student development, collaborative programs, industry relationships, and academic excellence. An internationally recognized researcher in compliant mechanisms, Magleby’s pioneering work has resulted in over 40 patents and 250 publications spanning theory, technology development, and advanced mechanical design, and the advisement of hundreds of graduate students.

He holds a B.S. and M.S. in civil engineering from BYU and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is deeply engaged in advancing engineering education, having co-founded a nationally recognized, industry-sponsored capstone design program. He has published on Capstone program design, leadership development, and study abroad for engineers and technologists.

UVU looks forward to the leadership and exceptional expertise Magleby will contribute to SCET. Magleby is poised to elevate the college’s mission, foster academic excellence, and strengthen connections within the UVU community.

To learn more about the Smith College of Engineering and Technology please visit uvu.edu/scet.

###

About Utah Valley University
Utah Valley University believes in the power and potential of every student. Our work is guided by a commitment to exceptional care, exceptional accountability, and exceptional results. We provide a high-quality education that is both affordable and accessible. From certificates to master’s degrees, UVU offers flexible, relevant programs grounded in hands-on learning and real-world experiences, ensuring that students graduate with career-ready skills and are ready to receive a strong return on investment. As an open-enrollment university, we invite students to come as they are, and they leave prepared to make an immediate impact in their careers and communities.

CONTACT: Sharon Turner Utah Valley University 801-863-6807 sharon.turner@uvu.edu

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.

For more than 30 years, a Utah woman says she and her husband poured their lives into his family farm. They worked the land, raised a family and even paid for half the house they live in.

There’s just one problem: none of it is legally theirs.

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On a recent episode of The Ramsey Show (1), the woman named Patti described a situation that sounded more like a financial trap than a stable retirement plan. Her husband works for his parents on the family farm, but the in-laws still control the salary, the house and, crucially, the future of the business.

“They control his salary, his time. They even control the house we live in. Like, we paid for half of the house and they refused to put any of it in our names,” Patty said. “We can’t even remodel it.”

The couple, who are in their 50s, assumed for decades that the farm would eventually become their retirement plan. Instead, she says promises about succession never materialized. No ownership transfers. No written agreements. No clarity about what happens next.

And when she pressed her husband about creating an actual plan, she says he accused her of something shocking.

“So now you want my parents dead,” he told her.

The exchange struck a nerve because it highlights a financial problem many family businesses quietly avoid until it’s too late: succession planning.

Handshakes and promises aren’t retirement strategies

Family farms and family businesses often run on trust, tradition and verbal understandings. But financial experts warn that it can become dangerous when assets, housing and retirement plans remain undocumented for decades.

Ramsey Show co-host Rachel Cruze didn’t mince words about the caller’s situation.

“You’re in a bad business deal,” she said. “That’s a marriage problem, Patti, between you and your husband.”

That may sound harsh, but estate planners frequently warn that vague inheritance expectations can create massive financial and emotional fallout later, especially in farming families where land values have exploded in recent years.

USDA data (2) shows the value of U.S. farm real estate has risen sharply over the past decade, accounting for nearly $3.7 trillion of farm assets in 2025 – making farm succession disputes potentially worth millions. At the same time, the average age of American farmers continues to rise (3), adding urgency for aging farm owners to put transfer plans in place before illness, death, or family conflict forces difficult decisions.

Why living in a home you don’t own can become financially dangerous

Patti told the Ramsey hosts that she and her husband paid for half the home but have no ownership stake on paper. That means they may have little legal protection if relationships deteriorate further, if the property is sold or if the estate is divided after the parents die.

“You legally have no assets, right?” Cruze asked during the call.

“Correct,” the caller replied.

It’s an arrangement that’s more common than many Americans realize, especially in multigenerational businesses where family boundaries and business boundaries blur together. Unless names are on a deed or there is a written legal agreement outlining repayment or equity rights, recovering that money later can become more difficult.

The caller described feeling trapped, financially insecure and unable to make long-term plans for retirement. At one point, Cruze suggested the deeper issue was no longer just about money. “For him to continue to choose them over you … that’s what hurts.”

Financial stress tied to extended family relationships can put enormous strain on marriages. American Psychological Association survey data show that money remains one of the most common sources of stress and relationship conflict (4) among American adults, including those in partnered relationships.

Read More: Almost 50 with no retirement savings? Here’s why you shouldn’t panic

Protecting yourself

Financial experts say the safest approach is to treat family business arrangements like any other major financial deal. Get ownership agreements in writing, make sure names are on deeds and titles, and don’t rely solely on verbal promises about future inheritances.

Couples should also build retirement savings outside the family business through IRAs, 401(k)s or separate investments so their future isn’t tied to someone else’s decisions. If succession plans remain vague for years, that’s a sign it’s time to consider contacting an estate attorney or a financial planner who can help families formalize plans before resentment and uncertainty spiral into larger legal problems.

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YouTube (1); U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service (2); National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (3); American Psychological Association (4)

This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.

TikTokers are infamous for doing whatever it takes to get their shot. And for a farmer in Utah, it was to his detriment.

Todd Brown is a farmer in Southern Utah who has been managing farmland for the past 20 years. He grows alfalfa and oats (1) and has 60 cattle. And up until last week, Brown has rarely had any issues with trespassing on his farmland, he told ABC4 (2).

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That is until 22-year-old TikTok user Emerson Nix posted a video of his truck parked on Brown’s crops. After his initial video — which he has now deleted — it happened again another night. When viewers of Nix’s TikTok saw where he took the clip, they wanted to pose their trucks in that ‘field,’ too (3).

Brown saw the trespassing occur, telling ABC, “I was just posting up in my shop down here and watching them pull out into my fields, and then I was calling the police, and they were coming out issuing citations. Went back out the next night, the same exact thing happened.”

In a follow-up video, Nix said he thought the farmland was just grass, and didn’t realize he was driving over crops. “At the end of the day, this is an honest mistake,” he said (3).

Viral stunts can create real financial damage for struggling farms

Regardless of Nix’s claim that the issue was an accident, Brown and his farm are hurting. “Farmers, we’re going to take it personal, you know, we’re the ones feeding your families … All of these crops feed my cattle, and when the cattle come off of the summer range, we sell the calves, the calves go to the slaughterhouse. That goes to your grocery store,” Brown said (2).

“Everywhere they drove their trucks, mashing down the crop is all crop-loss,” Brown told KSL (4). “It’s all dead and won’t come back. I can’t harvest that.”

Read More: Almost 50 with no retirement savings? Here’s why you shouldn’t panic

For farmers already operating on thin margins, even relatively small damage can matter. Last year, small and medium-sized farms in the U.S. were largely impacted (5) by Trump’s tariffs and cuts. This year, the increased cost of fuel and fertilizer have caused issues for farmers. According to the American Farm Bureau Federation (6), U.S. farms filing for bankruptcy reached 315 in 2025, a 46% increase from 2024.

Brown said the viral attention has been frustrating not just because of the crop loss, but because people seemed to treat working farmland like a backdrop for social media content rather than someone’s livelihood.

“I didn’t go through all that work to make my field into a TikTok haven or a parking lot for TikTok,” he said (2).

What looked like harmless content for TikTok viewers translated into a reminder that online trends can carry real-world costs for the people caught in them.

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YouTube (1); ABC 4 (2); TikTok (3); KSL (4); The Guardian (5); Facebook (6)

This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.

SALT LAKE CITY (KSL.com) — The start to the 2026 football season is still a few months away, but we begin our look into each of the teams Utah will play this season, starting with the first two games and then progressing each week with two more games before the unofficial start of the season with Big 12 media days in July.

Utah opens up its slate this season with a manageable early portion of the schedule before shifting to the tougher part (at least on paper). That should help Morgan Scalley and his squad in his first season as head coach as the team ramps up before the most pivotal games of the season later in the year.

Though the early part of the schedule should be easier, there’s enough of a challenge to give the Utes a good test that could help the team should it be in contention for a Big 12 title. The first two games, in particular, present good challenges to test Utah in different ways.

The early sportsbooks have Utah leading the conference (with BYU) with 8.5 wins. Could it be another 10-win season for the Utes, or will Scalley’s first season fall short of that mark?

Let’s start our look with the first two games of the season: FCS Idaho and Arkansas.

Idaho Vandals

Date: Thursday, Sept. 3 (TBA)Location: Rice-Eccles Stadium; Salt Lake City, UT2025 record: 4-8 (2-6 Big Sky)Final AP ranking: N/ALast meeting: Oct. 2, 1993 (Idaho win, 28-17)

It’s a tradition old as time: Utah starts off its season with a Thursday night game. The season-opener against Idaho should provide enough intrigue, especially with Morgan Scalley taking over the reins after a 20+ year stint of Kyle Whittingham calling the shots.

The Vandals return to Utah for the first time since Oct. 2, 1993, where Idaho earned a 28-17 win over the Utes. The return game should look drastically different with a Utah team seemingly in contention for a power conference title.

The Vandals come into Salt Lake City after having a down season in the Big Sky and some ensuing changes to the offensive staff, including the addition of Ian Shoemaker as the team’s new offensive coordinator after the previous OC was fired.

The offense and defense were average last season and middle of the pack in FCS. While there are pieces for a potential upgrade, there’s not an expected jump this season, even with a new coordinator and a good recruiting class.

Quarterback Joshua Wood is the star of the team and a strong veteran leader for the Vandals, but he needs more help to really make a splash on offense. Last season, Wood threw for 1,898 yards, 14 touchdowns and five interceptions. He added 589 yards and seven touchdowns on the ground as the team’s leading rusher.

Wood isn’t the most accurate, though, finishing at just 58.5% last season. He will be tested early against Utah’s rebuilt defensive line that is more focused on a better run defense.

Though the season-opener won’t provide a splash name coming into Rice-Eccles Stadium, Idaho presents an early look into Utah’s new offensive line and how well it can gel early. Though a good showing won’t fully predict success this season, it would go a long way to ease some initial concerns.

Arkansas Razorbacks

Date: Saturday, Sept. 12 (TBA)Location: Rice-Eccles Stadium; Salt Lake City, UT2025 record: 2-10 (0-8 SEC)Final AP ranking: N/ALast meeting: NeverPreseason win projection: 4.5 wins (Bovada)

Don’t let the Razorbacks’ record last season lull you into a false sense of security as they come into Salt Lake City the second week of the season. Arkansas lost 10 games last season, but half of those were by one-score games against quality opponents (Ole Miss, 41-35; Tennessee, 34-31; Texas A&M, 45-42; Mississippi State, 38-35; and LSU, 23-22).

The offense had veteran leadership and did more than enough to win games, but the defense let the team down — for example, the offense averaged 32.9 points per game, but the defense gave up 33.8 points. That’s not an easy way to try to win games.

Midway through the season, Arkansas went in a different direction and fired head coach Sam Pittman. The program turned to a proven winner in Memphis head coach Ryan Silverfield, who brought his offensive coordinator (Tim Cramsey) and several players with him to Arkansas to help rebuild a program picked last in the SEC this season.

Silverfield is more than capable of winning at Arkansas, but a quick jump is not likely with the turnover of the roster and several veteran players out. The biggest question for Arkansas will come at quarterback, where the Razorbacks will be forced to replace proven QB Taylen Green.

The Razorbacks will look to settle its quarterback battle this fall, where it’s down to sophomore returner KJ Jackson and Memphis transfer AJ Hill. Neither has a ton of experience, so this season will be a big learning experience for either QB.

Jackson threw for 441 yards and three touchdowns in five games for Arkansas last season, while Hill had just 223 yards, one touchdown and one interception in two games. From reports in Arkansas, Jackson has been more consistent and the mechanics have been better, but Hill has a leg up with Cramsey’s offense.

Either way, Arkansas will be working in a new quarterback, with Utah being the first true test for whichever player is named starter. One advantage the two quarterbacks will have is that Cramsey’s scheme attempts to get the ball out quickly, which could limit a Utah defense’s ability to get in the backfield and disrupt.

Arkansas will have two proven rushers is Braylen Russell and Memphis transfer Sutton Smith, who led Memphis last season with 669 yards and seven touchdowns. They’ll be joined by a rebuilt receiver room that returns CJ Brown and tight end Jaden Platt, and infuses proven talent from Memphis transfer Jamari Hawkins and Boise State transfer Chris Marshall.

Both Hawkins and Marshall had over 500 receiving yards last season and will likely be the focal point of the receiving game.

On defense, there’s a lot of turnover, but one of the biggest mainstays is defensive end Quincy Rhoades Jr., who had a team-high 15.5 tackles for loss and eight sacks. Defensive coordinator Ron Roberts, who comes to Arkansas after two years at Florida, will look to create havoc with his simulated pressures and two-high safety looks.

This will certainly test Utah’s new offensive line with the different looks Roberts will dial up, while making Utes quarterback Devon Dampier make smart decisions against a defense that runs a hybrid zone/man scheme.

Arkansas certainly has the roster and talent to make it a difficult game for Utah, even with several questions surrounding the team. It’s a steep learning curve and a lot has to go right for Arkansas, but Silverfield knows what it takes to win. The biggest question will be whether that can come in his first season with the program.

The post Utah football: Previewing the 2026 schedule with a look at Idaho, Arkansas appeared first on East Idaho News.

It’s hard to find many holes in an 11-2 football team. Yet, like everyone else, Utah wasn’t perfect during the 2025 season.

All things considered, the Utes don’t have many areas to improve upon going into the 2026 campaign. The change to Morgan Scalley as head coach shouldn’t be that big of an adjustment, considering he’s been part of the program for two decades now. As such, the expectations for Utah remain the same: be in a position to win the Big 12 title and compete for a spot in the College Football Playoff.

However, there are a few areas the Utes will need to improve upon if they’re to take the next step following last season’s finish in the Las Vegas Bowl. Let’s take a look at where Utah can grow in 2026.

Passing Game Explosivity

By most accounts, Utah’s offenses was one of the top units in the country in 2025. The Utes were among the five teams to average more than 40 points per contest (41.3, No. 4 nationally) and led all Power 5 squads with 3,462 total rushing yards (266.3 on average). Their proficiency on third down maintained lengthy scoring drives as well (Utah was No. 3 in the country with a 52.9% conversion rate).

If there was one area to nitpick, it would be the lack of explosiveness in the passing game. Averaging 7.4 yards per completion, the Utes tallied 202.8 passing yards per game between Devon Dampier and Byrd Ficklin during conference play. For context, the four Big 12 teams that averaged fewer yards through the air combined to go 13-24 overall.

Perhaps the dominance of Utah’s rushing attack took away some opportunities for Dampier to show off his arm. Either way, the renovations to the offensive line, additions to the wide receiver room and infusion of Kevin McGiven’s offensive schemes point toward there being more shots down the field in 2026.

Wide Receiver Involvement

When Utah utilizied three defensive players (Smith Snowden, Jackson Bennee and Lander Barton) in the passing game during the first weeks of the 2025 campaign, it signaled that the wide receiver room just wasn’t ready to go for the start of the regular season. Sure, it could’ve been an attempt to find a hidden two-way player on the roster, but upon reflection, it probably had just as much to do with the fact a hierarchy hadn’t been established among the team’s pass-catchers in spring and fall camp (losing projected starter Zacharyus Williams to USC in the spring portal probably didn’t help, either).

As such, it wasn’t until the back-half of the regular season that some of the portal additions Utah made in the offseason began showing up on the field. Ryan Davis was effective in the slot throughout, though Larry Simmons and Creed Whittemore took a while to find their footing. Coveted Cal transfer and 6-foot-5 target Tobias Merriweather struggled to create separation all season long, creating a perplexing wide receiver depth chart.

Simmons, Whittemore and Merriweather will have opportunities to hit the ground going into 2026 after getting a year under their respective belts. That group meshes with a talented portal class that includes 6-foot-3 junior Braden Pegan (926 yards at Utah State in 2025) and 6-foot-tall senior Kyri Shoels (768 yards at San José State in 2025). Pegan is expected to be the go-to guy as a four-star transfer with experience playing in McGiven’s offense from their shared time at Utah State.

Time will tell if Utah’s revamped passing game is deserving of the hype its received this offseason.

Rushing Defense

The most perplexing thing about the Utes defense in 2025 was the unit’s struggles against the run. Utah hardly looked like the physically-imposing team of years past, especially down the stretch of the regular season. The Utes allowed its final five opponents to rush for 206, 133, 472, 290 and 161 yards, inflating their season average to 181.2 rush yards allowed per contest (third-worst in the Big 12).

If the Utes are going to be more stout in the trenches in 2026, it’ll likely be because new faces along the defensive line stepped up in big ways. After losing three rotational players on the interior in Aliki Vimahi (graduation), Jonah Lea’ea (transfer) and Dallas Vakalahi (transfer), plus pass rushers John Henry Daley (transfer) and Logan Fano (NFL), Utah is set to usher in an entirely new starting D-line that’s likely going to feature multiple underclassmen.

The Utes need sophomores Pupu Sepulona, Karson Kafusi, Jireh Moe, Lucas Samsula and Dilan Battle to collectively make a big impact in the run game for the defense to be better in 2026.

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