What's next? How BYU football can move on from rivalry loss, prepare for reeling Vols

PROVO — Where do you go after losing nine-straight rivalry games to No. 14 Utah?

That’s the question for the BYU football team after a 30-12 loss. And if you ask head coach Kalani Sitake, who has deadpanned and occasionally dead-eyed several “big-picture” questions directed at him, the answer is simple.

“We’ve got to move on, and learn from the mistakes of this game,” Sitake said. “Put it behind us, and learn for the next one. Utah’s a really good team; they have been given a lot of predictions and accolades, and they deserve it.”

Emotional, wide-eyed and with some hardly caring enough to answer a few questions from the media, the Cougars (0-1) left LaVell Edwards Stadium into the darkness of the earliest hours of Friday morning. The Utes (1-0) were every bit of their national ranking, their preseason hype, and their potential playoff projections. Everything is still in front of them this season, as fans dream of Rose Bowl berths and Pac-12 champions.

What can the Cougars look forward to?

Here are three ways to move on quickly before traveling to Neyland Stadium next Saturday at 5 p.m. MDT.

Still making mistakes? Learn fast

Amid all the hype and love and talk surrounding quarterback Zach Wilson, perhaps one thing was forgotten for the most blue-goggled Cougar observer: he’s still a sophomore.

That doesn’t mean that Wilson, the three-star Corner Canyon product who committed to BYU over offers from Boise State, Iowa, Cal and others, won’t be a top quarterback for BYU. It doesn’t mean he hasn’t already produced his fair share of highlights, many of which won’t be forgotten very soon.

But it means the 20 year old still has some growing to do.

Take Thursday night, for example, when he completed just 21-of-33 passes for 208 yards and two interceptions — both pick sixes, to former BYU linebacker Francis Bernard and to distant relative Julian Blackmon.

On more than one occasion, Wilson was scrambling. And whether by his own do-it-all instincts, the lack of pass coverage, an athletic play by a defender or (most likely) a combination of all that and more, the sophomore made the wrong play and could only watch as his team fell behind another 6 points without the defense taking the field.

Frustrating. Deflating. But those things happen — in football and in life. How you respond to the down moments is what defines you.

“I think there are quite a few guys trying to do that, to make the plays themselves,” Sitake said. “Guys trying to make plays themselves, and being undisciplined — it wasn’t just Zach; there were others in this game. We pride ourselves in everyone doing their 1-11th, and that didn’t happen.”

Fewer turnovers, more Ty’Son

While two interceptions were the highlight of Utah’s defense, it wasn’t the only turnover battle that BYU lost on the night. The Cougars also fumbled the ball inside the 30-yard line, and Utah capitalized, finishing with 20 points off turnovers in an 18-point win.

And while the BYU defense can hardly be blamed for allowing a pick six, linebacker Isaiah Kaufusi refused to let the offense take all of the blame.

After all, his guys didn’t force a single takeaway. Not an interception. Not a fumble. Not even a crucial fourth-down stop in the second half.

“You want to win the turnover battle,” Kaufusi said. “Statistically, if you turn the ball over more, your chances of winning are slim. But that’s football; they made great plays. They have great players, and we have to do our best to respond to whatever happens, whatever comes our way.”

Maybe the best BYU could respond on offense, then, was to simply sustain their own drives. Keep the defense off the field.

Run the ball.

The Cougars averaged 4.2 yards per rush, even when factoring in a few net-minus moments from Wilson and backup quarterback Jaren Hall. That includes 6.4 yards from Ty’Son Williams, the South Carolina graduate transfer who was named starting running back a week before the game.

But when push came to shove and the offense needed a boost, Williams was “the guy” less often than not. He had just seven carries for 45 yards, a long run of 18 yards and a second-half touchdown to salvage his night.

“I think the problem was not being able to sustain drives,” Sitake said of the run game. “The issues, the penalties, all of it put us in some bad positions. It’s one of those things that we’ll have to watch on film, to see what we can do to get more points. But I don’t want to take anything from the Utah defense; they made some good plays. They made things difficult for us — for the most part they are a really sound defense in the run game.”

It can always be worse

If you thought BYU had a bad night in losing to a heated rival ranked in the Top 25 on national television, think how the Cougars’ next opponent felt.

Perhaps the closest thing about Tennessee’s 38-30 loss to Georgia State was the score. The worst loss in the modern era of Tennessee football, the Panthers finished the 2018 season with a 2-10 record after a seven-game losing streak. But you wouldn’t have known that at Neyland Stadium, where the Vols were 26-point favorites in some corners of Southern Nevada, yet got pushed around 24-13 in the second half.

Georgia State held the Vols to 3.0 yards per carry on the ground, forced a pair of late turnovers off quarterback Jarrett Guarantano, and had six tackles for loss with four sacks.

The Vols, too, will be looking to move on and forget about Week 1 of the 2019 season.

“Are we all disappointed today?” Tennessee coach Jeremy Pruitt asked rhetorically during his post-game press conference. “Sure we are. But the sun’s going to come up tomorrow, and we’re going to get ready to play BYU starting tomorrow. We’ve got to bring our best game next Saturday.”

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