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SALT LAKE CITY — File this anecdote under BYU legend, rivaling those of Jimmer Fredette going against prison inmates and dribbling a basketball in pitch-black church hallways.
By now, after three national broadcasts of BYU football, we know the story of Zach Wilson and John Beck. During each game, like clockwork, the respective broadcast team has gone to great lengths to note the connection between the past and present BYU quarterbacks.
As the story goes, Wilson spent many weekends over the summer making the 10-hour trek down I-15 to sharpen the finer points of playing quarterback during training with the master guru. Beck, who led BYU to an 11-2 record in 2006, has parlayed an NFL career into tutoring quarterbacks in Southern California.
"He is very good at training QBs," said Aaron Roderick, BYU’s passing game coordinator.
Typical of stories that are told and retold many times, they grow bigger with each repetition. As BYU continues to experience success this season, with Wilson piling up impressive numbers, Beck’s mentoring will increase in stature.
Everybody, including national media starving for any new and different insight, loves to tell a good story. It comes as no surprise then to hear the broadcasters highlight the Wilson/Beck association.
At this point, given all the publicity, Wilson-to-Beck is becoming nearly as popular as Beck-to-Harline. The latter represents one of the best plays in program history in which Beck threw across the field to tight end Jonny Harline for a dramatic touchdown pass on the last play from scrimmage to beat Utah in 2006.
What’s it all mean? Probably no more than anything else that has helped Wilson improve, which was natural considering his development as a third-year quarterback.
Same thing goes for Fredette, who received incredible publicity in 2011 on BYU’s Sweet 16 basketball team. He probably didn’t need the lights off at the local stake center to become the national player of the year as a senior.
But it certainly added spice to Fredette’s rise to stardom. Expect the same for Wilson, whose statistics have been spectacular in BYU’s 3-0 start.
Through the three games, which BYU won by wide margins, Wilson has completed 83.3% of his passes (60-of-72) for 949 yards with six touchdowns and one interception while basically playing only the first three quarters. Roderick said a realistic goal for Wilson’s completion rate is 70%, which is an outstanding number.
For comparison sake, Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young holds the BYU record by completing 71.3% of his passes in 1983.
"He’s been dang near perfect," Beck told Yahoo sports. "Sometimes you see a quarterback have a game like that. To see him have three in a row is pretty remarkable."
Much like Beck, Wilson is flourishing in his third year as a starter. Both quarterbacks battled inconsistency during the early years of their respective college careers. In addition, many of the starters around Wilson have grown up together over the last three years at BYU.
"Experience is the biggest factor," Roderick said. "In your third year, the game slows down. I think the other big part of it is the players around him are playing at a really high level. Most of the guys who are playing significant snaps for us are in their third year in this offense and it’s starting to show."
Roderick went on to say, "In the past sometimes Zach would do young things and sometimes the guys around him would do young things, which would force him into situations where he’s scrambling doing something that maybe we hadn’t planned on."
Wilson’s phenomenal play has put him on the radar as a potential NFL quarterback. Former college coach Rick Neuheisel, who played quarterback at UCLA, on his national radio show guaranteed Wilson will play in the NFL.
"From an athletic standpoint, he’s top of the charts," said Beck, who spent six seasons in the NFL. "And from an ability standpoint, he’s top of the charts. Yes, there are guys with stronger arms. But those are the elite of the elite, like Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen."
And, as we know, those guys can throw a football over a mountain.
More from Patrick Kinahan:
BYU and Boise State need each other to gain national credibility
Expect BYU to follow up its first two easy wins with a string of blowouts through the month of October. They need, and deserve better competition — which may be coming their way in about five weeks.
