BYU took a triple hit Friday night—they lost to Utah State 35-20, and with QB Taysom Hill's season-ending injury the outlook for this year is hurt and probably kills their long-shot Playoff hopes.
Utah State came into the game with quarterback problems of their own as Chuckie Keeton had once again been lost for the year, a scenario we worried about in our preview of the Aggies. But as we noted there they have an experienced backup in Darrell Garretson, who completed 19 of 25 passes for 321 yards and 3 TDs.
With 2 minutes left in the 2nd half Hill was tackled while scrambling and broke his leg. Utah State was leading 21-14 at that point and BYU would score only 2 field goals for the rest of the game with Christian Stewart at the helm; he completed just 10 of 29 passes with 3 interceptions, making BYU's outlook for the remaining 7 games pretty grim.
BYU was expected to dominate this game, and our power ratings had the Cougars winning by 28 points. So they'll get a considerable downgrade, but it won't come close to capturing the change in the team without Hill. For now, they'll still be favored in every game going forward, but not by nearly as much. While an 11-1 finish is still possible due to their easy schedule, their College Football Playoff odds—last week 13.1%—are going to plummet. Our numbers will probably put their new hopes at around 2.0%, which again doesn't even account for the loss of Hill. If it could, the number would be close to 0%, and really, any non-Power Five team that already has a loss is fighting a very uphill battle even if they manage to win out.
Two undefeated teams bit the dust before the weekend, and at least three more will fall today. That will leave 12 or fewer teams in pole position for the inaugural Playoff.
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