Utah Utes football notebook: Losing a 'foreign feeling' for Utes

Losing is an adjustment for the Utah Utes.

Team captain Zane Beadles said it was a "foreign feeling" after Saturday's 31-24 setback at Oregon.

Prior to the loss, Utah had won 16 consecutive games — the longest active win streak in the nation.

"We'd like to win them all. Like I said after the game, we'd love the winning streak to go to 100 if we could. But the reality is things end," said Utah coach Kyle Whittingham. "You've got to regroup, be ready to persevere and handle some adversity."

Starting center Zane Taylor vows the loss will become "ancient history" after the team watches the game film.

"I'm going to get all that out of my system, as I'm sure the rest of the guys on the team will," he said. "We're just going to get it over with and we're going to focus on the rest of the season and start a new winning streak."

Utah's recent run of success followed a 17-10 setback at BYU on Nov. 24, 2007 and began a few weeks later with a 35-32 win over Navy in the Poinsettia Bowl.

"I don't want to ever take winning for granted. But a lot of these guys in the program have never experienced a loss," Whittingham said. "I'll never say a loss is a good thing — I'll never believe that — but maybe it'll open some eyes and (show) how hard it is to win a Division I football game..."

The loss, he continued, should make everyone appreciate the victories and understand how difficult it is to get it done.

"What we've got to do now is move forward. We've obviously got to play better. The key right now is how we react to this," Whittingham said. "We haven't been in this situation for quite a while, which is a good thing. It says we've been doing some good things along the way."

CAIN STILL ABLE: Despite a subpar outing against Oregon, Terrance Cain will remain in place as Utah's starting quarterback.

Whittingham made that clear in his press conference Monday afternoon. He told reporters that Cain is "still our guy" and there is no quarterback controversy.

"We think he's the guy that gives us the best chance to win," Whittingham said. "We'll just keep heading down that direction."

Backup Jordan Wynn, he added, won't necessarily redshirt. The coaching staff would like to get the true freshman some reps in case he needs to step in at some point.