Utah Utes, BYU football: It's deja vu all over again for Utes

Fans flooding the field. Goal posts coming down. An undefeated Utah football season.

Haven't we been here before?

If you ask the Utes, this stuff never gets old. For the second time in five seasons, they are heading to a Bowl Championship Series game.

Saturday's 48-24 win over BYU wrapped up a perfect regular season for the Utes. OK, not completely perfect, but you get the gist. It's hard to argue with a 12-0 record, even though they did mess with people's heads along the way.

There were those hair-raising finishes, the dubious margins. But suddenly, decisively, the 2004 Utes' awkward little brother was all grown up.

"We wanted to come out and show people that when we put it together, we can be pretty good," said quarterback Brian Johnson.

So now it's waiting time again. The win guaranteed Utah's admission to an elite group of postseason games called BCS bowls. Whether it's the Sugar, Orange or Fiesta bowl is unclear. Sure, the Utes are undefeated and think they should be playing for a national championship, but that's not how it works. When you're an outsider, you don't just have to be perfect, you need the right ZIP code, too.

Asked if his team deserves to play for the national title, Johnson replied, "Why not? We're talented enough. Now we just have to sit back and see where the chips fall."

"It's very much a long shot," admitted coach Kyle Whittingham. "We've done what we can do."

Which was quite a bit of doing, by the way.

That the Utes would follow the lead of the undefeated 2004 team certainly wasn't guaranteed. Experts thought they'd be good but not BCS good. But Utes pulled a rabbit out of their hat against Oregon State and TCU. They dodged bullets against Michigan, Air Force and New Mexico.

Nobody — including the Utes — knew exactly what they'd bring on each ensuing Saturday. Was it the overpowering, versatile Utes or the herky-jerky, indecisive Utes?

Everyone seemed to be waiting for their erratic offense to cost them a game. Columnists and commentators kept saying there was something missing with this Utah team (mainly a consistent offense).

To borrow a line from Dr. Seuss, they puzzled and they puzzled 'til their puzzlers were sore.