Riding 3-game losing skid, BYU football has 'made the choice to fight'

PROVO — BYU wide receiver Puka Nacua checked into the weight room early one morning this week with storm clouds hanging over the Cougars' campus and even thicker clouds hanging over a program that lost its fourth game of the year in embarrassing fashion last Saturday.

But he couldn't help but smile for some reason.

The former four-star recruit who leads the team with 60.6 receiving yards per game and six total touchdowns smiled when he saw each of his teammates back at work, trying to snap a funk that is unlike anything the Cougars have seen in at least four years.

The former Orem High star who transferred home after initially signing with Washington smiled because he saw a group of players that were hurt, but not satisfied with the way they've played the last three games. That included players on offense, defense and special teams.

And he smiled because he knew what that meant.

"The objective is to never lose on Saturday; that's never in the game plan during the week," Nacua said. "But to come back in on Monday and see all the guys — it's a good pain, in the weirdest sense.

"We felt the hurt for everybody, for the guys who are injured, for the guys who have bumps and bruises late in the season, and coming off the loss. But to feel the energy of something that we've been going through the mud, it feels like everybody can feel the mud we're stuck in."

BYU (4-4) faces a crossroads, a moment of adversity on the football field that rivals any the Cougars have faced in Kalani Sitake's seven seasons as head coach. At the very least, it's the most BYU has seen since the ill-fated 4-9 campaign of 2017, when drastic changes came down on the program that included a near-overhaul of the offensive staff, beginning with former coordinator and Cougars quarterback legend Ty Detmer.

It's natural to assume similar changes may come to this BYU team, but Sitake has confirmed over and over that they won't come in the middle of the season.

The Cougars still have four games to play, and perhaps the most important of them is Friday night. Lose to East Carolina (6 p.m. MDT, ESPN2) and bowl eligibility is suddenly very much in doubt with road games left at Boise State and Stanford, as well as the regular-season home finale against Utah Tech.

"They have our attention," Sitake said of the Pirates, who are eager to defeat a future Big 12 member for the second-straight week after a 34-13 win over UCF. "We don't have time to feel sorry for ourselves. We have to get rolling and working hard. We have to show that we can get back to our identity."

Rather than fire or flail or flap aimlessly in the wind, BYU is going to try another F-word.

They're going to fight.

"We've made the choice to fight and not give up," said BYU punter Ryan Rehkow, one of a lengthy list of captains and leaders on the team. "Now, what are we going to go and do to improve ourselves, to rise above that adversity when it hits."

Sitake has taken over play-calling duties for a defense that ranks among the worst in the Football Bowl Subdivision in every major statistical category, including 103rd in total defense. Defensive coordinator Ilaisa Tuiaki now works exclusively with the defensive line and moved to the field on game day, while defensive ends coach Preston Hadley took his former spot in the booth.

Any changes to scheme or attack weren't heavily noted after the Cougars gave up more than 500 yards for the second-straight game in a 41-14 loss to Liberty. But last week's loss wasn't about schematics, offensive coordinator Aaron Roderick said.

Blame the adults in the room, the coaches, if you will, but no one is taking the skid harder than the players and personnel.

"Offensively, I was really surprised. I thought we've always been a very resilient group, even when we weren't that good and we were building this offense," Roderick said. "I thought we were always a team who would thrive in adversity and play really hard in tough situations. I didn't think we did that on Saturday, not like I'm used to seeing.

"The good news is, we have a group of guys who I have seen do it before. When the chips are down, we've been a team that rises up and is up for the moment. We've done that this season, multiple times."

If confidence is shaken — and of course it is, tight end Isaac Rex admitted Tuesday on a taping of the Kalani Sitake Show on BYUtv — but that same confidence can be rebuilt. It wasn't absent earlier in this year, after all, and all it takes is one good half, quarter, series or even play of good execution to get it back, Roderick added.

"We've been a confident team, and I still believe in these players," the offensive coordinator said. "It's the same players who played very well for us in the past. But Saturday was not who we want to be as an offense.

"None of us are happy at all. We're going to stand up to it, and take it on."

BYU's philosophy of "love and learning" is still in place, but it's a different kind of love, and a more intense form of learning that is required now, Nacua said.

"The guys in the locker room, everybody felt it," Nacua said. "I wouldn't necessarily say the word 'love,' but there was learning.

"There was love and learning. But love has many different forms."

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