BYU Football

It’s August 2nd and BYU’s 2020 football season is in serious trouble. 

With four of the fiver power five leagues announcing they will play conference-only schedules to minimize the spread of COVID-19, BYU has lost 6 games from its schedule: Arizona State, Stanford and Utah from the Pac-12; Minnesota and Michigan State from the Big 10; and Missouri from the SEC. Rumored replacement games against Alabama and Texas A&M are also out of the question.

With just six games remaining on the schedule, including three against teams from the Mountain West Conference-which is likely to follow suit and go conference only-BYU needs a big break in order to find a competitive schedule this season. So what are the program’s options?

Part rumor, but larger part Twitter speculation from overzealous BYU fans, there was talk that BYU could play in the Big 12 conference this year. However, according to Matt Mosley from the Dallas Morning News, there is “no chance” that the Big 12 will give them temporary membership for the season.

Brigham Young’s best opportunity appears to be getting the Mountain West to toss them a lifeline and let them join for the season, but they are at the mercy of commissioner ...

This Saturday really is going to be a special day because we will have the Grand Utah College Football Quinfecta: What is the grand Utah College Football Quinfecta, you may ask? Well, every division 1 football team in the state(yes Weber and SUU count) have home games all on the same day. And I will be going to all of them. Just kidding. But anyways in celebration of this special day, I will preview all of these games, like what they will have to do to win, how it will affect the season and whatever else I feel like saying. Also, mother nature is clearly not a fan of the Grand Utah College Football Quinfecta because have you seen the weather for Saturday? Smh. 

Utah St: vs. Nevada @8:15 2 weeks ago Big Blue ill-advisedly got stuck in a cage with Mike the Tiger and got thrashed around for 3 hours. But luckily they had last week off to put on some bandaids and heal some wounds and they should be ready for Nevada. The Wolf Pack come to Logan with Last Chance U quarterback Malik Henry and are hoping to ride some momentum off their win against ...

4 games into the college football season and we are starting to get a taste of who is good and who isn’t out west. This highly scientific poll based on my personal opinion ranks all the teams in the Pac-12 and Mountain West, + BYU + Weber. 

1. Cal: The mighty Golden Bears of Berkely are the Pac 12’s only undefeated team left and possibly their final hope for making the playoffs (Good luck). They have not entirely over-powered anyone in any game, (ex: Cal 23, North Texas 17), but their victory over Ole Miss and their one-point win over Washington in Seattle puts them number one on the list.
2. Washington: The lightning delay game against Cal was probably a fluke and the Huskies would likely win in a rematch, but we here at PMH respect head to head wins and therefore put Cal ahead. Anyways, Washington QB Jake Eason is playing well, and UW is coming off two impressive victories over BYU and Hawaii and looks like the best team in the Pac-12.
3. Oregon: Oh ducks. Ya blew it. With the whole country watching opening weekend you let a 15-point lead slip away while Auburn Freshman Bo Nix rallied his team to victory. Oregon ...
4. Thoughts on BYU heading into the Washington Game

   The excitement of the past two weeks has created the kind of buzz the BYU Football program has not experienced in many years. There have been some big wins over the past 8 years or so of independence but never two in a row over Power 5 teams, and in such dramatic fashion.

   It remains to be seen if the Cougs have some magic left for Washington tomorrow. Can they line up and go toe-to-toe with a team that pounded them 35-7 last year? If BYU were to win tomorrow, they would most certainly climb into the top-25 rankings and BYU fans along the Wasatch Front and throughout the country would be absolutely delirious.

   I have attended each of the first 3 BYU games. The atmosphere at Lavell Edwards stadium to start the Utah game was electric. That obviously faded in the 2^nd half. The showing of 13,000 BYU fans in Tennessee was amazing and was a great reminder of two things: 1) BYU really does have a national fan base and 2) Wasatch Front BYU fans are crazy about their team and are willing to spend time and money to follow them. While in Tennessee, I met several die-hard fans from ...

5. BYU’s Win Over Tennessee Exemplifies the Cougars’ life as an Independent

   “Snap Zach, handoff Ty’son, to the five, four, three, pile is pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing, he gets to the goaline!, no signal, they mark him short but he’s in the endzone – Touchdown! They signal touchdown! He got in and the Cougars win!” -Greg Wrubell

6. Ranking the Importance of BYU Football’s Games In The 2019 Season
   
   
   By: Jacob Nielson
   BYU is ready to embark on year 9 as an independent. As the ESPN contract expiration looms, and the team fights their way back to relevancy, this is an important year, for Coach Kalani and the whole university. The young but fairly experienced team will be ready to take the field, come August 29, and we all look forward to seeing how the team will compete against a grueling schedule. So with that, I present the 12 games, from the least important to the most:
   • 12. Idaho State (11/16): Because BYU needed that 6th home game. Its senior day, maybe let Austin Kafentzis play Quarterback.
   • Purple Mountain Haze is Back!!!

     Purple Mountain Haze is back up and running! Look for new posts on the upcoming college football season with plenty of analysis and opinion on BYU, Utah and Utah State. All three teams are expected to have good years. As well, there will always be a little baseball and Utah Jazz/NBA sprinkled in. And don’t be surprised if you come across an occasional human/community interest story. My son Jacob will be one of the contributors going forward. This blog has always been a fun hobby but other priorities have preempted it for the past 3+ years. Thanks for coming back and here’s to a great college football season in the Beehive state!

   • BYU Football will be on the National Stage this Weekend – Ready or Not

     I wrote in my season preview post that I thought the Missouri game would end up being the biggest game of the year for BYU football. I figured they’d have two or three losses already, be out of New Year’s 6 Bowl contention and have nothing left to play for except improving their national brand against the two-time defending SEC East champs – Missouri. I think this still holds true for the most part. BYU only has two losses but they really don’t have a shot at a big bowl game. Missouri is still the two time defending SEC East champs but they’ve turned out to be a very mediocre football team this year. What’s obviously going to make this game so important and watched is the recent racial unrest at Missouri and the interest in the protests that resulted in the resignation of Missouri’s President and Chancellor.

     The game will be broadcast on the SEC Network at 6:30 Central time. The game is being played at the home of the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs – Arrowhead Stadium. So it’s basically a home game for Mizzou. It’s really not a big game but folks are sure gonna tune in because the ...

   • The Case Against the BIG12 – Why they’ll be left out of the playoff again and why that’s good news for BYU

     Guest writer, Rob Gray has put together a fantastic piece on how the BIG12 really does not stack up well against the other power 5 conferences. He’s got great data to back up his point.

     With the College Football Playoff rankings being released this week there are opinions coming from around the country on which teams were slighted and which teams got lucky. I can see arguments that the SEC may have again benefited from “SEC bias” and that the PAC12 should be higher with two one loss teams in a very strong conference. I understand if people think that Ohio State is simultaneously the beneficiary and victim of being the returning national champion. What I cannot understand is any argument that the BIG12 has been graded unfairly, if anything I think that they have been given too much credit.

     TCU and Baylor have had very weak schedules to this point in the season. Combined they have only played one team outside their conference from a Power 5 conference, the mighty (.500 record) Golden Gophers from Minnesota. Neither team will play an out of conference game again the rest of this season which means they are relying heavily on the reputation and ...

   • BYU Begins the “Boring” and “Soft” Part of Their Schedule – BYU UCON Preview

     BYU kicks off at 8:30 tonight against UCON at Lavell Edwards Stadium. This is the annual “General Conference” game that they have often played against Utah State. The LDS Church is hosting their semi-annual 2 day conference on Saturday and Sunday so the Cougs play tonight. It’s not that big a deal anymore since they’ve gone to Friday night game so much anyways.

     I don’t know a ton about UCON other than they are better than last year when BYU went to Connecticut and beat them 35-10. BYU is favored by 17.5 points. I’m afraid it could be a little closer than that. The game will be televised on ESPN 2.

     The real story of the game will be if BYU can get up off the mat after the embarrassment last week, re-establish themselves and come out and beat a team they should.

     The other thing to watch will be the mood of the fan base. After the awesome slate of games in September, BYU now plays five teams in a row not from the Power 5 conferences. A bunch of these are gonna be the 8:30 Saturday night ESPN2 type games. Will fans still come out in droves to support the team? ...