In biggest test to date, Huskies find a way

— -- SALT LAKE CITY -- This game will get buried in the history of No. 4 Washington's already special season. If the Huskies make it to the playoff, that means they will have won games with more on the line. If they don't make it to the playoff, no one will remember.

That's too bad, because what Washington did to win at No. 17 Utah, 31-24, on Saturday is what championship teams do. The Huskies won on the road against a ranked team. They won when they took a 14-point lead and gave it up, won when the second-biggest crowd in the history of Rice-Eccles Stadium (47,801) had revved up into full roar on a spectacular fall afternoon.

The Huskies won with the nation watching the biggest opportunity on their schedule to demonstrate how good they are. That's because the rest of the Pac-12 this season is begging to be confused with the mediocrity of the Big 12.

Who else in the Pac-12 is going to give Washington an opponent that will earn the Huskies some playoff brownie points? USC, which has won four straight games and lost to Alabama by 46? Washington State, the only other unbeaten team in league play, which lost to FCS Eastern Washington? A possible Pac-12 championship game against Colorado, which is much better but after the past two decades has no street cred?

No, after winning their past three games by an average of 37 points, this was the Huskies' opportunity, and they seized upon it.

"You never really know until you're in that situation," quarterback Jake Browning said. "We embraced the fourth-quarter fight. Obviously, the blowouts are nice. But you want to pull [these] out. So that was big for us."

Browning's stat line won't help him in the Heisman race. He completed 12 of 20 passes for 186 yards with two touchdowns and one interception. That pick, with Washington ahead 14-0 in the second quarter, brought Utah to life. The Utes spent the rest of the first half and nearly the first seven minutes of the second half -- a total of 14:55 -- running 33 plays to the Huskies' three, and scoring 17 points to take the lead.

Washington hadn't been behind since the second quarter of the Arizona game, four games ago, 252 minutes and 11 seconds on the clock. The Huskies needed exactly six plays to regain the lead, but this game had become a battle. Utah came back and tied it at 24-24 with 9:07 to play.

Let's get back to Browning. That interception he threw would be his only glaring mistake of the game. He read the defense correctly and got the Huskies into the right play with an ease and efficiency that belied his sophomore status.

And then, with the score still 24-24, and the Huskies facing a fourth-and-8 at the Utes' 41 with slightly more than five minutes to play, Browning began a series of five plays that won the game for Washington. He began it with his foot.

Washington head coach Chris Petersen didn't send his punt team onto the field. Browning, lined up in the pistol, took the snap and delivered his second punt of the season, a poocher that rolled to a stop at the Utes' 1.

The defense, which had forced only one other punt in the second half, held Utah to 2 yards in three plays. Safety Budda Baker, who had stayed on his side of the line of scrimmage for the entire game, crashed forward on first down to nail Utes back Joe Williams for a 2-yard gain.

Williams quit the team three weeks into the season because he was sore and couldn't take the punishment anymore. He has run for nearly 700 yards in the three games since he returned, getting 172 yards on a career-high 35 carries Saturday. Someone better check on him Sunday.

The Utes went no farther, and with the ball on the 3, in came Utah punter Mitch Wishnowsky, who had done nothing all day except prove why he's the best in the game. Wishnowsky had punted five times, averaging 53.7 yards per kick, dropping four of them inside the 20, and hung the ball so high that Huskies returner Dante Pettis had a total of 2 return yards.

"It's hard," Pettis said. "That guy is good. He has one of the best legs I've played against. I was lining up at 50 yards, having to run back 15 more yards to get set up under it and have to drift back even more because the ball would just carry. That one didn't. He was backed up so he didn't have as much time to get set up and kick that ball."

Wishnowsky punted it 55 yards, but the ball came out low and hard and never soared like his others. When Pettis caught the ball at the Washington 42, he had time. He ran right, to the wide field, and went backward about 5 yards to evade the coverage.

"I knew Coach Pete would be mad if I got tackled right there, so somehow I slipped out of it," Pettis said. "I was literally, 'I can't get tackled right now. I can't get tackled right now.' "

Pettis got to the sideline and pivoted upfield. He had a wall of blockers to his left and no red jerseys in sight. Replay showed anywhere from one to three blocks in the back by his teammates, none of which the officials called. The 58-yard touchdown, Pettis' second punt return for a score this season, provided the winning margin for the Huskies (8-0, 5-0), extending their winning streak to 11 games.

"That's a good football team we played today," Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said. "They're talented, they have a terrific quarterback, they're well coached, they're solid in all three phases and they beat us."

Petersen, who is begrudging in praise of his own team, agreed with Whittingham.

"I just like it when they answer hard tests," Petersen said. "They've come out, they've been ready to play. We've started fast and got really good momentum going. That's all fun. That's fun and that's nice. But I do like it when we get in these hard situations and they have to figure out a way. I think that's going to give us some confidence down the road when we have to do another hard situation."

The Huskies must play at defenseless Cal next week. They get USC and Arizona State at home, then go to Washington State for the Apple Cup. The way Washington played Saturday, on the road against a very good team, it's easy to imagine that the Huskies will play at least two games after that: the Pac-12 championship and a College Football Playoff semifinal.