How to fix the BYU program

Salt Lake Tribune -- BYU committed seven turnovers — two that USU senior cornerback Jalen Davis turned into pick sixes — as the Aggies took a 40-24 win in front of 24,112 at Maverik Stadium.

“That was an awesome win, a team win,” said USU coach Matt Wells. “I am happy for that locker room. That was a long time coming, a tremendous win.”

The Aggies (3-2) snapped a two-game losing skid to the Cougars (1-4) and beat BYU for the first time in Logan since 2010, and the third time in the past 11 meetings.

“Way too many errors for us to overcome to win this game,” BYU coach Kalani Sitake said.

The Cougars not only lost the Old Wagon Wheel, they probably lost another quarterback for a considerable amount of time — not good considering their next two opponents are Boise State on Friday and Mississippi State the following week.

Ouch. Needless to say it’s been a rough month for the BYU football team. First, the revamped offense that coaches and fans had been looking forward to for months, failed to cross the 50 yard line against a team that just lost at home against Troy. Second, the Cougars lost at home to their arch-rivals for the seventh straight time. Then starting quarterback Tanner Mangum went down with an injury. That led to backup Beau Hoge getting the starting nod against Wisconsin, and promptly lost 40-6 at home. And if it couldn’t get any worse, BYU lost this weekend to a Utah State team coming off a three win season.

So consequently the topic of how to fix the BYU football team has been the talk at watercoolers at Vivint and Doterra. I figured that as a life-long BYU fan it is my sacred duty to provide advice to BYU and head coach Kalani Sitake on how to turn around the BYU football program.

First, please, PLEASE pick a shade of blue and stick with it.

This has been a sore spot for me for years. BYU has a rich history of tradition dating back to the 80’s and 90’s when they were a machine that would produce star QBs year after year. From 1979 to 1990 the Cougars won 123 games and they looked good doing it. Those royal blue uniforms became iconic in Provo, Utah as the BYU football team won National Championships and Heisman Trophies.

Then came that fateful day in 1999 when BYU decided to move away from royal blue and embraced a new tradition: navy blue and tan. BYU has since moved away from using tan (thank goodness), however navy blue and white has remained BYU’s main color scheme. Recently BYU has embraced the notion of tradition and history and along with that has come a resurgence of royal blue. Now while BYU has fully embraced tradition, they have been hesitant to fully embrace royal blue and has been left in an awkward “color limbo.” If BYU can’t pick a shade of blue, how are they expected to choose the better QB? (Say what you will, but can we at least agree BYU needs to stop trying to wear both shades of blue at the same time?)

Second, redo your locker room.

This is 2017 and in today’s football world players like three things: flashy uniforms, winning and facilities. We’ve already discussed the first, flashy uniforms, and have come to the conclusion that BYU needs to stick with a single shade of blue. The second, winning, only comes when you get good players, and you need flashy uniforms and facilities to get good players. So that leaves the third thing, facilities. BYU has a nice weight room and lounge areas for players, and Lavell Edwards Stadium is the largest stadium in Utah. Despite this, BYU does have one area where they can improve, the locker room. The locker room is where the players physically and mentally prepare for the game. There’s a reason schools and teams make their locker rooms luxurious and make the visiting team’s locker room looking sad, dreary, and sometimes pink.

So with schools putting so much money into facilities and locker rooms it’s time for BYU to do the same. No more plywood looking lockers and no more paintings of Captain Moroni. It’s time to invest some money into making BYU’s locker room look less like a high school and more like a division-one football team. If you’d like some ideas look no further than what Texas did this off-season.

Third, hire coaches and a coaching staff with experience at the college level.

I love Kalani Sitake. He is a tremendous guy and gives his all for his players, and I want him to succeed. That is why, when you hire a first time head coach, you surround him with all the help he can get and make sure the assistant coaches around him know what they’re doing. There’s a reason first time head coaches typically have an assistant coach, or two, that have previously been head coaches. They’re new to the job and they need help sometimes. So here is the help Sitake has and their coaching experience:

OC Ty Detmer- no college coaching experience, 6 years as high school coach.

DC Ilaisa Tuiaki- position coach at USU, Utah and Oregon State 2008-2015

Assistant Coach Ed Lamb- Head Coach at SUU 2008-2015 (45-47 career record)

WR Coach Ben Cahoon- one year as BYU WR coach (2011-2012)

RB Coach Reno Mahe- no prior coaching experience

That’s not enough help for a head coach who’s been coaching for years let alone a first time head coach. Only one coach has prior experience as a collegiate head coach, and couldn’t even post a winning record at a D-II school, no other coaches have experience as a coordinator and your offensive coordinator have 0 experience coaching at all! That is not a recipe for success. My advice? Start from scratch with assistant coaches and position coaches and find guys who have experience coaching at the collegiate level and can help Sitake acclimate to being a head coach.

Fourth, don’t limit yourself in terms of coaches you can hire.

Now once you’ve began your search for new coaches, don’t limit yourself in terms of which coaches you can hire. BYU ran into this problem when they were searching for a replacement for Bronco Mendenhall because BYU has a weird rule where their head coach must be an active member of the LDS church. This limited BYU to two coaches when they were looking for their next head coach, Sitake and Navy coach Ken Niumatalolo. This is not an issue you want to face when you want to win football games. I’ll let you in on a little secret, when you want to win football games you get the best coach you possibly can. I realize BYU is an LDS owned school and they have certain rules they want their sports teams to follow. But can we meet in the middle(ish).

Do you need to be a member of the LDS church to be a good person and be capable of providing a good example to athletes? No. So why can BYU not find a good coach and a good “leader of men” whether they are LDS or not? There are several good coaches and good men who are not LDS but who may have connections to BYU. Enter Mike Leach. Leach has proven to be a great head coach who knows how to win games, and guess what? He’s a BYU graduate who learned how to coach by watching Lavell Edwards. Oh, and he was raised LDS. So why can BYU not hire Leach? He’s a BYU guy and plays the same style that made BYU great in the 1980’s and 90’s. If you don’t need to be LDS to play at BYU, why do you need to be LDS to coach there?

Fifth, join a conference.

Leaving the Mountain West Conference 7 years ago seemed like a good idea at the time. The heads of BYU fans were filled with grand dreams of being an independent football program and displaying the power of BYU football and eventually being invited to join a Power 5 conference. Well that dream never became a reality. BYU has been independent ever since and has become a program searching for a home. Sure there have been fun times. BYU beat Ole Miss one year and there were the back and forth games against Texas. But BYU was never able to get that coveted invite from either the PAC-12 or the Big-12 conferences. So as the saying goes, “beggars cannot be choosers.”

BYU is an LDS school so forgive me if I use an LDS scripture. “Are ye stripped of pride? I say unto you, if ye are not ye are not prepared to meet God.” Intense. So BYU, it’s time to swallow your pride and crawl on hand and knee back to the Mountain West and ask them to take you back. The Mountain West is the place for BYU. It’s a place they can call home and it’s a place they can excel in. BYU had a run with the big boys of college football and proved they can’t keep up. BYU is 14-23 against Power 5 schools since 2009 and 3-12 against ranked teams. So if BYU wants to enjoy success and winning seasons, they should be playing against teams like San Diego State and Wyoming. What BYU fan doesn’t kind of miss their yearly bouts with Air Force? Those were fun games. And the Mountain West has only gotten better since BYU left. With the additions of Boise State, Hawaii and Utah State, and the improved play of San Diego State, Wyoming, Air Force and New Mexico, the Mountain West Conference has become a fun and competitive conference. It’s time for BYU to find a home.

Sixth, do away with dumb rules and regulations.

So this is similar to number four. Let me put you in the shoes of a recruit. You’re the number one ranked recruit in the state of California, a four-star QB and you’re being recruited by BYU and Utah. You’ve gone on a official visit to Utah and now you’re visiting BYU. You visit the campus and classrooms. You’ve met with a revamped coaching staff that features former head coaches who have proven they can win at the highest level of collegiate football and you’ve met with head coach Mike Leach, who has finished with a winning record in 13 of his 16 seasons as a head coach. You’ve visited the redone locker room in LES and seen the weight room and various other facilities around campus. You’ve tried on the same royal blue uniforms that you’ve seen Steve Young and Jim McMahon wear. Now it’s time to commit to a school. But before you commit you meet with AD Tom Holmoe and ask if there is anything else you should know before making your final decision. He hands you a copy of the BYU Honor Code. You begin to read through it: no drugs, no alcohol and no inappropriate behavior. Seems fair. But then you keep reading. No long hair, that means you now have to cut the hair you’ve been growing since sophomore year of high school. That’s no fun. No beards. Why? Beards have become acceptable fashion throughout the country, you think to yourself. You can’t wear sleeveless shirts, but what about when it’s August and 100 degrees? I can’t wear my Kobe Bryant Jersey? No girls in your apartment or dorm room. That’s dumb, you think as you wonder where you can hang out with a group of friends. Oh, we can hang out in the lobby, but only till midnight? None of that sounds fun. This is supposed to be college. The one time in your life when you live away from home and you can be a young, dumb adult. But how are you supposed to have fun when you can’t even grow a beard or stay out late. You hand the copy of the honor code back to Holmoe. Two days later you sign a National Letter of Intent to the University of Utah.

Now I’m not saying that BYU should do away with the honor code altogether. However, this is not the 1950’s anymore and a large amount of BYU’s rules are outdated. No beards? No long hair? No hanging out with girls in your apartment? BYU is like the strict parent. And one thing is for certain, no kid wants to go to the friend’s house who has the strict parent. The same goes for college, when you have a lot of rules you are going to drive away some of the better players. Getting rid of the no caffeine rule was a good start but there’s still a ways to go.