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SAN DIEGO — BYU won its first bowl game since 2012 with a 24-21 victory over Wyoming in Wednesday night’s Poinsettia Bowl at Qualcomm Stadium.
Jamaal Williams, Kai Nacua, Harvey Langi and a host of other seniors saw their Cougar careers end with another nail-biting finish, capping off a 9-4 season with four losses by a total of eight points.
“I’ll take wins no matter how they come,” BYU coach Kalani Sitake said. “But it’ll be nice to not keep them so close.
“We’d like to put it out of reach. But we give a lot of credit to our opponents, and Wyoming did a great job of getting back into the game. We thought we had the lead, and we felt them pushing and their momentum.”
Here’s how each group graded out on a soggy night in San Diego.
Offense: B-
Jamaal Williams ripped off a BYU bowl game-record 210 yards and a touchdown, but also fumbled for just the second time in his career in the opening quarter. He ran for his sixth 100-yard game of the season by halftime, when he totaled 118 yards on 14 rushes for an eye-popping 8.4 yards per carry.
Tanner Mangum threw his first interception of the season in his first start, but also threw a TD strike to Tanner Balderree — that also hit three other players in the hands.
Whether by weather or lack of execution, things were sloppy in the first half.But maybe a little more for the Pokes than the Cougars.
“Weather affected both teams, but I thought it maybe affected us a little bit more, certainly handling the football,” Wyoming coach Craig Bohl said. “Not only on regular downs, throwing the football, trying to catch it and then some special team plays. But that's part of the game.”
Defense: B+
Both teams combined to miss their first seven third-down conversion attempts in the stormy San Diego weather, but the BYU defense forced the first big play to set up Mangum’s opening touchdown.
Even when the defense made a mistake, such as Micah Hannemann’s clear-cut targeting and ejection in the third quarter, they made up for it. Dayan Lake picked off Josh Allen on the subsequent play with 1:43 left in the third quarter, and the Cougars went on to take a 24-7 lead on the first play of the final period.
Harvey Langi had a career-high 16 tackles and a tackle for loss, and though Sae Tautu didn’t get a sack on the play, but he did force Allen into an intentional grounding after the Cowboys had rallied to pull within 24-14 on Tanner Gentry’s first fourth-quarter TD grab. The senior finished with 113 yards and two touchdowns in the final year of his prolific Wyoming career, and nearly led an epic comeback before Kai Nacua forced an interception to end the Pokes’ final offensive series with a minute remaining.
“It was awesome to be able to do this and for us seniors to go to our first bowl game,” Gentry said. “That’s what’s really cool about college football.”
Special Teams: B
Not a whole lot to say here.
Jonny Linehan did his thing, averaging 39.6 yards per punt and downing four of them inside the 20. Aleva Hifo offered up a solid 22-yard kick return, but it ultimately met little to the BYU offense.
Perhaps the biggest special teams play came against Wyoming, which botched a punt attempt after Ethan Wood mishandled a long snap and Morgan Unga set up Mangum’s three-yard touchdown run.
Coaching: B+Sitake became the first BYU coach to win a bowl game in his inaugural season; predecessor Bronco Mendenhall, Gary Crowton and legendary LaVell Edwards all lost their first bowl game as a head coach.
Like the players, it wasn’t always pretty. But BYU’s defense came through in the end, and though they gave up their first second-half points in a month, Ilaisa Tuiaki’s adjustments helped pave the way to Nacua’s game-clinching interception and Ty Detmer’s play-calling led to Williams toting the ball 26 times for another record-setting day in his prolific BYU career.
Was it a perfect game? Not necessarily. But like the new starting quarterback, Sitake and the coaching staff are also learning on the job.
“I think he just didn’t throw stupid passes, you know?” Sitake joked of Mangum. “That one pick, he knew was wrong. He’s a great player and takes risks.”
Overall: B
BYU sent a hefty group of seniors, including Williams and former starting quarterback Taysom Hill, into the sunset with the program’s first bowl win since 2012. Even with some shaky moments down the stretch, the Cougars look toward an offseason with a 9-4 season — one that, if given the choice at the start of the year, would’ve seemed like a pretty tempting option.
