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Provo • The Cougars showed up for their showdown against Nevada's famed pistol offense with the equivalent of a pellet gun on Saturday at LaVell Edwards Stadium. Worse, it fired blanks when BYU got into scoring territory, resulting in another frustrating loss for the proud program in a month that opened with promise.

Despite glimpses here and there of some offensive punch in freshman quarterback Jake Heaps' first career start, the Cougars couldn't finish when they had to and fell 27-13 to the streaking Wolf Pack in front of 61,471 fans, many of whom went away perplexed by some questionable coaching decisions and the offense's inability to get into the end zone in the second half for the third straight week.

"I think we are improving," said coach Bronco Mendenhall, which was pretty much the theme of the postgame news conference.

The Cougars (1-3) found it harder to describe how the improvement is showing, after dropping their third-straight regular season game for the first time since 2005 — Mendenhall's first season. Given BYU's lack of firepower on offense — it has scored a whopping three points in its last three second halves — duplicating that 6-6 season in 2005 suddenly looks questionable.

Getting just six points out of five trips inside Nevada's 25-yard line doomed an upset bid over a club that is now 4-0 and looking to crack the national rankings on Sunday for the first time school history.

"There were times in the game when we just needed some plays, and we just needed to finish on some of those offensive drives. If we finish on those drives, the game is very different," Heaps said.

The biggest failure in that regard came midway through the third quarter. Trailing 24-10 at halftime, the Cougars exchanged punts with the Wolf Pack, then put together a nice drive to get to the Nevada 16. But Heaps missed an open Bryan Kariya on third-and-4. On fourth down, BYU hoped to catch the Wolf Pack off guard and hurriedly ran a sweep to the left with Kariya, but he was stopped well short of the first down marker.

"Blue zone still needs focus and work," Mendenhall said. "Coming to the right player with the right design is something we've been good at [in the past] but we still have work to do. That's the best way to explain it."

Nevada then essentially won the game with a 21-play, 75-yard drive that took eight minutes and 53 seconds off the clock and ended with a 29-yard field goal by Anthony Martinez.

The Cougars answered the drive with of their own that culminated in a 29-yard field goal by Mitch Payne, much to the dismay of the booing crowd. Mendenhall said he elected to take the field goal on 4th-and-3 instead of try for a touchdown so he could cut it to a two-score game.

"It just seemed that would make it clearer for what we had to do the remaining part of the game," he said. "Obviously not a very popular decision by [the reaction of] those who were watching the game, but I would do it again — probably 10 out of 10 times."

The decision was magnified when defensive end Vic So'oto intercepted a pass by Colin Kaepernick and returned it to the Nevada 28, giving the Cougars a last gasp with 4:22 remaining. But Heaps was sacked on fourth-and-5, and the comeback hopes were thwarted.

"We drove down the field quite a bit," said Heaps, who was 24-for-45 for 229 yards with no TD passes and no interceptions. "We were able to pretty much have our way with their defense. We just couldn't finish."

So, the second half score was 3-3, which Mendenhall said he will focus on this week as the Cougars get ready for Utah State on Friday. Nevada had 313 of its 435 total yards in the first half, another moral victory of sorts for a team that wouldn't have dreamed of such a thing the past few years while playing against a WAC team in its own house.

But this isn't an ordinary BYU season, Mendenhall reminded again Saturday night. —

Storylines

R IN SHORT • Punchless on offense in the second half for the third straight week, the Cougars slow down high-scoring Nevada but can't spring the upset win.

KEY MOMENT • Trailing 24-10, the Cougars are stopped on fourth-and-4 from the Nevada 16 midway through the third quarter.

KEY STAT • BYU gets six points out of five trips inside Nevada's 25-yard line.