Following an incredibly successful first season and earning Pac-12 Freshmen Defensive Player of the Year honors, expectations are high for linebacker Lander Barton heading into 2023. During this past offseason, Barton has been heavily focused on improving his game and has added roughly 15 pounds in the process.

According to the coaching staff, Barton hasn’t lost much if any of his explosiveness along the way and he shared what that adjustment has been like.

“I feel good,” Barton said. “It was an adjustment in the summer. I was working at keeping the speed up. But now that we’re at the end of fall camp and going through the summer workouts, I feel good.”

Reflecting on the offseason, Barton was instructed to work on two things. Foot speed and getting stronger. Heading into the season, he feels confident in those areas and Utah fans should expect a stronger and more explosive backer.

“[Coach Scalley] wanted me to work on my foot speed, that was a big thing, and just getting stronger in the weight room. I feel like I did a good job of that over the summer. We did a lot of speed training, a lot of lifting too, so I feel like I was able to excel at both of those things,” Barton explained.

As the defending back-to-back Pac-12 Champions, there's been a well-deserved buzz surrounding the talent of this team and what they can accomplish. Along with all that, there’s a strong belief from the program that this is one of the best teams they’ve been a part of from top to bottom.

“We have a special group this year,” Barton said. “We’re going to surprise people.”

Heading into just his second season, Barton already recognizes that there’s a lot on the line. In what will be the Utes final season in the Pac-12 with an opportunity to do what no program has done before, the young linebacker has some big goals but understands they will need to take it a game at a time.

“We want a championship. We want a three-peat but we’re also looking for more,” said Barton. “We want a National Championship, too. At the same time, we’re going to go week in and week out, and just focus on each team every week.”

The sky's the limit for both Utah and their blossoming star, as they get set to kickoff the 2023 season.