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PROVO — BYU's football staff grew again Monday as head coach Kalani Sitake prepares the program for its forthcoming move to the Big 12 in two years.
Three months after adding a handful of on-field support staff, Sitake brought in eight new additions and staff promotions to fill out a staff that will be led by new football chief of staff Jon Swift. Of the group, six are promotions or additions from other areas of the athletic department, including student life and academics.
"Kalani's vision has always been that we got where we are with the bodies we have in the building, both on the coaching staff and on the support staff," Swift said. "To reward those efforts and to stick with the people who got us here made the most sense."
The moves are a continuation of athletic director Tom Holmoe's "unprecedented" extension offered to Sitake through the 2027 season, and increases the Cougars' program budget to the size of their soon-to-be peers in the new conference.
"Tom said it was unprecedented, which means we'll go through waves of adding people," Sitake said. "I'm not really patient, so I'll keep asking — and in the meantime, we'll work towards getting this team ready to play for the season. We're functioning as a P5 program; we've been doing that for a long time. The work is there."
Swift spent the past four years as director of football operations. In that role, he focused on the daily operations of the football department, including active roster management and serving as the liaison with the office of student life and admissions.
In his new role, the Cincinnati, Ohio, native who earned his undergraduate degrees at BYU will lead a team of directors on the football support staff in areas such as recruiting, player experience, alumni relations and player development.
Billy Nixon replaces Swift as director of football operations after spending seven seasons on Sitake's support staff, including director of equipment operations and player experience since January 2021 where he helped codify the Cougars' uniform and branding lineup with a designed slate of royal, navy and white helmets, jerseys and pants.
Additional new roles are Jack Damuni as director of football relations, who previously worked as Sitake's director of on-campus recruiting and community/player relations; former BYU defensive back Brandon Bradley as director of campus experience, a former academic administrator; former BYU basketball standout Mike Hall as director of player development, hired from the university's honor code office; and Dan Wilcox as director of football sports performance nutrition.
Bradley, a BYU defensive back from 2007-10 and owner of the DB University Elite skills training program, has been an academic advisor with BYU's student-athlete center since 2018 following a three-year stint as program manager of BYU's extramural sports, where he oversaw the university's acclaimed club programs like men's and women's rugby, lacrosse and men's soccer.
Hall, who played shooting guard at BYU 2003-05 before a five-year career in the Continental Basketball Association, moves over from his role as honor code office administrator to a director of player development role that will work closely with BYU's Built4Life initiative and manage internship opportunities and other off-the-field opportunities for the football team.
Wilcox has been the team nutritionist for the BYU football program since 2012, when he founded Elite Nutrition and Fitness Coaching. The former PGA professional and University of Utah graduate has spent 30 years devoted to understanding the science of the human body and the psychology of success, and will take that experience into a role directly with BYU football.
"I'm a competitor," Bradley said. "The opportunity to come and be a part of this as BYU prepares to go to the Big 12 was very enticing for me, to be a part and to make BYU a competitor — not just in the Big 12, but nationally. I think that's the vision that Kalani and Jon have, as well as the athletic administration. Just knowing that was the goal and the vision, it was exciting for me to go and be a part of it."
Six of the new additions are job promotions, divvying up responsibilities previously shared primarily between Swift, Damuni, Nixon and recruiting coordinator Jasen Ah You, bringing in former athletic department personnel to work directly with the football program.
"I think we all felt stretched thin, and so it will be nice to take every aspect of the program a bit farther," Nixon said.
The two additions will also complement the rest of the staff as it prepares to join the Big 12 in 2023, as well.
Former BYU receiver Justin Anderson returns to Provo as director of player personnel after spending the past six seasons in the same role at East Carolina. Anderson, who played at BYU from 2000-2002, returns to BYU after serving in the same role on Bronco Mendenhall's staff in 2015 — before following Mendenhall to Virginia and helping the Cavaliers sign the two highest-ranked recruiting classes in program history.
Josh Hewitt has been hired to replace Nixon as director of football equipment operations after similar roles at three schools over the past eight years, most recently at UNLV.
It won't take long for Cougar Nation to recognize that he is arguably the best in the nation and is going to take our program to the next level. With him at the helm, we take a step closer to providing our athletes with the best Player Experience in college football.
— Billy Nixon (@byuequipment) May 2, 2022
A third-generation equipment manager, Hewitt is just the fourth head football equipment manager at BYU in the past 75 years, and comes to Provo after spending a lifetime in the business. A four-year starting offensive lineman at Avila University in Kansas City, Hewitt's father Todd was the equipment manager for the Los Angeles/St. Louis Rams from 1979-2011 and first gave Hewitt a start in the room named after his grandfather Don.
"Equipment is in the blood. I'm not going anywhere else," Hewitt said. I don't think you can find a better place to be, to do what you want to do, to support the players and staff to make it better.
"That's all we're going to do: continue to build on what Billy started, to enhance it any way we can."
Prior to spending the last three years at UNLV, Hewitt directed football equipment operations at Fresno State, Central Arkansas, and worked with the NFL's Rams and MLB's Kansas City Royals on the grounds crew from 2010-14.
"Josh is a very humble guy, and he didn't want to self-aggrandize his bio. But we need Cougar Nation to know who we have on board with us," Nixon said. "I've been very impressed with the Hewitt family. I got to know his dad Todd at USC, and I was so impressed with what he was doing to increase the player experience.
"To see what he's done the last couple of years at UNLV, to take their uniform game to the next level … in the equipment world, it does not go unnoticed."
