Steak or sizzle? No. 11 BYU's 31-point win over TCU should beef up resume — style points or not

PROVO — Perhaps the flashiest part of BYU's 44-13 rout of TCU was the lack of flash in the Cougars' first home game in nearly a month.

Unlike that Oct. 18 rivalry win over then-No. 23 Utah, Saturday night's 31-point victory was almost never in doubt.

Much like how No. 6 Texas Tech looked every bit of a College Football Playoff team in a 29-7 drubbing of BYU, the Cougars returned home and looked like a squad determined to get to the Big 12 championship game (for a likely rematch) in jumping out to a 24-3 lead before allowing a touchdown and outscoring the Horned Frogs (6-4, 3-4 Big 12) 17-3 in the second half.

"The Big 12 is crazy," BYU coach Kalani Sitake said after his team improved to 9-1 and 6-1 in Big 12 play, with a one-spot boost to No. 11 by both the Associated Press and coaches' polls. "Around this time of year, you have to be ready to play to the end. We saw a lot of games in college football today and how close they were, so it was nice being in control of this one."

Controlled and decisive. The Cougars' 447 yards of offense converted a season-high 21 of their 28 first downs in the first half, scored on its first seven drives against their former Mountain West rivals, and ran for 151 yards against the third-best rushing defense in the conference.

BYU's 44 points are the most TCU has allowed in 2025.

"We had a hard time getting off the field defensively," said TCU's Sonny Dykes, whose team had a five-game winning streak dating back more than 15 years snapped in the series. "Up to this point, we've been playing really good defense, and we struggled tonight. Every time we got them to a third or fourth down, they executed a really high-level play, and we had such a hard time getting them stopped to get off the field.

"Offensively, we struggled, too."

The Cougars held the Frogs to a season-low 13 points in BYU's first victory by more than 30 points over a power-conference opponent in 10 seasons under Sitake, and limited prolific TCU quarterback Josh Hoover to just 10-of-23 passing for 183 yards and two interceptions.

The cherry on top was Tanner Wall's fourth-quarter interception that the senior safety returned 68 yards for a touchdown, the first time he's scored a touchdown since the converted wide receiver was a senior at Virginia's Yorktown High in 2017.

While grateful for the pick, as well as another by sophomore rising star Faletau Satuala, Wall gave credit to the Cougars' defensive front. Led by Isaiah Glasker and Max Alford's team-high six tackles a piece, the Cougars sacked Hoover four times and added two more tackles for loss.

That included Evan Johnson's first career sack on a corner blitz that helped hold TCU to 1-of-10 on third downs.

"It was diligence and discipline of the defense to do such a thing," said defensive tackle Keanu Tanuvasa, the Utah transfer who had his first sack since Sept. 6 against Stanford. "That's our capacity, and that's who we are, and we stuck to that this week. We did that tonight, and that is the result when we beat ourselves."

Was it perfect? Absolutely not. But could the Cougars have done more?

In a world of style points and CFP selection committee considerations, BYU finds itself competing for an at-large selection to the 12-team playoff with the likes Ole Miss, Oregon, Notre Dame and Oklahoma — the latter of which vaulted three spots in the AP poll following a 23-21 win over now-No. 10 Alabama.

That's one spot above the Cougars, who at 9-1 are behind three two-loss teams. Surely, a few extra style points could've helped, right?

"I just want to win the game," Sitake said matter-of-factly. "That really is the best style to me.

"I was not thinking about any of that stuff. We were just trying to grind the clock. We were not overly conservative at the end. We were just trying to finish the game."

Besides, at 9-1, BYU still controls its own destiny. Win out, and a spot in the Big 12 championship game Dec. 6 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, is guaranteed. Even one loss in the final two games might give the Cougars an advantage, based on tiebreaker scenarios.

The most important game is the next one — another late kick against suddenly struggling Cincinnati, which dropped out of the AP Top 25 after its second straight loss and third overall (6 p.m. MST, FOX).

The eyes of FOX's "Big Noon Kickoff" as the "biggest party in college football" visits Nippert Stadium for the pregame show. And the CFP will obviously be watching a BYU squad that will try to bring its "Vampire Cougs" home mythos to the Queen City.

"Give us an 8:15 p.m. game at home, it's going to be hard to come in here and beat us," Wall said. "That gives us a lot of confidence.

"Just grateful that we play for a fanbase that packs out the stadium every time we play."

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