Urban Meyer Says Next Step For Utah Football Is Winning A Championship

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah – Former Utah head coach Urban Meyer thinks the next step for the Utes is to win a championship.

Meyer thought that Whittingham has done a great job with the program after taking it over when Meyer left to be the head coach at Florida.

“I thought it would take them a while but he’s (Kyle Whittingham) done great,” Meyer told KSL Sports. “Obviously, the next step is you got to go win a championship. His players know that, he knows that. But what he’s done, he’s one of the best there is.”

Listen to Meyer’s full interview on the Crimson Corner podcast, below.

What Meyer Told Whittingham After He Left For Florida

When Meyer coached at Utah, they were in the Mountain West Conference. In two seasons with the Utes, Meyer led the program to two conference championships. Seeing what Kyle Whittingham is going through now in the Pac-12, Meyer recalled telling Whittingham to be careful what you wish for.

“I told Kyle (Whittingham) after I left, I said ‘be careful what you wish for, I used to play Wyoming, San Diego State, Air Force and New Mexico,’ which are all great programs. ‘But you’re now playing Oregon, Cal, Washington, USC, UCLA,'” Meyer said.

.@CoachUrbanMeyer on the next step for the @Utah_Football program:

"You gotta go win a championship."

Catch the full interview w/ @TrevorASports on the Crimson Corner podcast.https://t.co/BUHY4TTERZ pic.twitter.com/c9UfpQJNxT

— KSL Sports (@kslsports) July 23, 2020

‘BCS, Non-BCS’

When Meyer was at Utah, the national college football analysts would describe teams as BCS or non-BCS schools. That would make Meyer upset.

“I’d get very upset on national TV,” Meyer stated. “I can’t remember the guys name but he would say, we’re a BCS or non-BCS. I used to get so angry saying ‘well, we have better players than most BCS programs. Were a better team than almost all the BCS programs and I was young and had a lot to say back then. So I would come out on the media and say ‘that’s nonsense. We belong in the Pac-10’ Chris Hill and I, we just kept saying we need to do this.”

That mindset eventually got Utah in the Pac-12 and after 9 seasons in the “Conference of Champions,” Utah is searching for their first Pac-12 championship in football. The Utes were close in the last two years by reaching the game but still search to bring the hardware back to Salt Lake City.

Trevor Allen is a Utah Utes Insider for sports.ksl.com and host of the Crimson Corner podcast. Follow him on Twitter: @TrevorASports. You can download and listen to the podcast, here.