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Utah receiver Mycah Pittman is a busy guy.
In addition to preparing for the upcoming season, he’s taken to the sky for flight school while earning his pilots license. He’s worked his way up to completing solo flights by himself and communicating with air traffic control as he progresses to his eventual goal of becoming a commercial pilot.
“I feel so good about myself right now. It’s a lot of hard work, but dude, it just feels like a normal day for me now,” Pittman said in a YouTube video last month chronicling his flight.
“I’m pretty confident in everything I do as a pilot now because of my instructor. I will keep giving him credit because, yes, I’m willing to learn, but he was willing to teach and he’s an awesome teacher and he’s still teaching me, he’s still helping me,” Pittman said.
Shortly after landing back at the origin airport, it was time for football practice. All in a day’s work for the senior wide receiver.
On the ground, the Florida State transfer has recovered from a season-ending injury that cut his first year with the Utes short just two games into the season. That was the fourth surgery of his college football career.
“Injuries have been kind of a plague in my career, and it’s something that I’ve been trying my best to stay on the field,” Pittman said. “I was here active all spring camp, no injuries, thank the Lord, obviously.”
This season — his second year at Utah — will be the first opportunity for Pittman to catch passes from Cam Rising, which was one of the biggest reasons that he transferred to Utah. Pittman has known Rising since the eighth grade, and Rising’s Newbury Park High and Pittman’s Oaks Christian High dueled in 2016, when the two California schools played in a record-setting game.
In that contest, Rising threw for 485 yards and five touchdowns, while adding 141 yards and a score on the ground, setting a Ventura County record for total offense, while Pittman had 205 receiving yards and a touchdown.
“He’s a good guy and he’s always been my guy,” Pittman said of Rising. “And then seeing what Coach (Andy Ludwig) could do with his playmakers and things like that. Last year was a little bit of a rough year, but seeing what Lud has been able to produce, it’s hard to say no, and I had a good opportunity to play some ball out here.”
Pittman only had three receptions for 20 yards in two games last season before his injury, but in his last relatively healthy season at Florida State in 2023, he had 32 receptions for 330 yards and three touchdowns.
Rising is looking forward to working with him in the slot, calling Pittman “world class” while catching the ball underneath in an interview last year.
“Spring’s gone good. I feel like I closed out the practice really well, made a couple big plays. Still very hard on myself as always, like I should be, but made the plays that I need to make,” Pittman said.
Pittman is part of what looks to be an upgraded receiver room, featuring Money Parks, USC transfer Dorian Singer, Syracuse transfer Damien Alford, Daidren Zipperer and Munir McClain, among others.
“The room’s been coming together good. Guys are encouraging each other, guys are competing. Guys want jobs obviously, so it’s only going to lift the guys up and make guys make more plays,” Pittman said.
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- Who are the best Utah college alums in each NFL franchise’s history? (Deseret News)
- Eighth-inning rally boosts USC over Utah in Pac-12 baseball tournament (Deseret News)
Up next
- May 23-25 | Track and field | NCAA regionals | Fayetteville, Arkansas
- May 24 | Baseball | Pac-12 tournament | @ Scottsdale, Arizona
- May 24-29 | Golf | NCAA championships | @ Carlsbad, California
- May 25 | 8 p.m. | Baseball | Pac-12 tournament | @ Scottsdale, Arizona
All times MDT.