Utah coach Kyle Whittingham has a five-point plan to win football games. No. 1 on the list is to play great defense.

As the Utes showed in their 22-10 win over Wyoming at Rice-Eccles Stadium on Saturday night, the strategy continues to be mighty sound.

While Utah's offense struggled in Wyoming territory and its special teams had a miscue in missing a field goal, the defense continued to thrive. The Utes held the Cowboys to just 202 yards, and the lone touchdown they allowed came on a trick play.

"Our defense has been good for a lot of years," Whittingham said. "Those guys just play hard, they believe in each other and they make plays. They came up big today."

The Utes' defense may have been thinking shutout while scouting Wyoming's no-huddle, spread offense. But the Cowboys, who had already been blanked by Colorado and Air Force this season, started the game well.

Wyoming got on the scoreboard first with a field goal and took a 10-3 lead when quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels caught a 30-yard touchdown pass from Robert Benjamin on a classic, pass-back-to-the-quarterback play.

That was enough for the Utes, who were determined to shut down Carta-Samuels and the rest of the Cowboys' offense during the remainder of the game.

"We let their quarterback run all over the place," said linebacker Stevenson Sylvester. "That was something we knew we had to take care of at halftime."

The Utes' defense took care of the game while the offense took its time finding itself. In the third quarter, Utah held Wyoming to 21 net yards of offense. The Cowboys had just 7 rushing yards in the second quarter and 1 rushing yard in the third. Wyoming gained 74 yards of offense in the second half.

Carta-Samuels told a reporter that the Utes showed him a lot of different looks in the second half. Sylvester disagreed, saying Utah's defense just played better.

"We didn't change anything," he said. "The scheme was the same. We just tried to execute better in the second half."

Several Utes contributed to the stifling defensive effort. Koa Misi had eight tackles and two sacks. R.J. Stanford made his first career interception in the fourth quarter to go along with two pass breakups. Justin Taplin-Ross had a career-high six tackles. Utah had five total sacks with Sealver Siliga, Derrick Shelby and Christian Cox each recording one.

For the second straight week, the Utes' defense had to make a key stop to help preserve the win. Utah took its first lead of the game at 16-10 with 7 minutes, 35 seconds remaining. The Cowboys had two possessions while trailing by six, and one ended when Stanford made an interception and the other with a sack by Shelby.

"It was really a defensive win," said quarterback Jordan Wynn.

e-mail: aaragon@desnews.com