The Delemma We Have With our Loved and Appreciated Coaching Staff

Football
1

I/we love our head coach, Kalane Satake.
I/we love the coaches which he has chosen to work with.

Our current HC is all that I /we want our coach to be with only one exception. (More on this later)

(I/we) (am/are) reminded of Lavel Edwards: “I would rather live in Provo and lose in Laramy than to win in Laramy and have to live there.” I/we love our current coach, Kalane Sitake. We want to keep him.

I like it when our GA’s preach to us to give us guidance and understanding.

I like it when our Stake President preaches to us to give us direction.

I love it when our Bishops preach to us to nourish our souls…

I love the lessons and directions in our Sunday School Classes and in the Priesthood meetings.

I love the 2.5 minute talks from our grandchildren and great grandchildren.

When it comes to football, I want the coach to talk to us about football. I do not like the football coach to be my mission president or my seminary teacher. I want only football from my football coach.

I hate cute slogans from the coach. I hate it when one of our coaches tells experienced, highly trained coaches throughout the country, how they should coach and how they should be more moral, realizing that these are just kids playing the game and that coaches should never run up the score.

Next, a proud P5 team, (UCLA) from a proud
P5 Conference (Pac 8/10/12), comes to Provo, and we beat them 59-0. Oh, I forgot at the end, we did play some of our 2nd and maybe even 3rd string players. (at the very end).

I don’t want our coach to be cute and clever. I want him to be serious about football. I want my Bishop to be serious about the Church and the God Head and the doctrines.

Our HC is about as perfect of a man and of a coach that I have known. He walks in the footsteps of our beloved Lavel Edwards. He deserves this compliment.

The one exception:

Our HC and his staff must find a way, he must find the time, and he must put forth the effort and the focus to make sure that the same team, and the same coaches, that was our Cougar team and Cougar coaches, that beat USC, is going to be the same team that plays each and every one of the 12 teams we play each season from this day on until the end of time, with unwavering consistency. This is a must , that must be done l

We must be consistent in making sure that the Cougar team and the cougar coaches that played and coached in the games vs Utah, Washington, and Toledo, are not allowed in our sites anymore. They may not be called cougars anymore. We have seen enough of that. We know what our coaches and team are capable of and we require consistency in that capability.

We, most of us, have been patient while learning how to play a near P5 schedule.

After 4 years, the end results have not shown too much growth from the first year to this last year.

Patience among some of us is growing slim.

I/we (for one/ for all), want each of our coaches to stay, but we require that they figure out how to show more growth in our learning process from year to year.

We need to remind them, the coaches and the players, that we are grateful for the coaching and the planing and the focus, and the work that went into the USC game, and that we want no less from all 12 games that we play. No politics. Get Bushmann the ball and don’t deny him the opportunity.

Summary:
I/we do not want any coach changes. I want our current coaches to show more consistent progress.

I /we want our AD to give assurance to our coaches that with notable improvement, their jobs are secure, but indeed, with the remaining teams on our schedules as the easier half of our schedule, much more consistent planning, coaching, and playing needs to show much more effort and positive results.

Ron
Anyone that agrees with this post, please add your name to it and it will be from all of us. State you agee in a different post and I will add your name to this.

If you disagree, please let us know where you disagree. In Summary, we all love and respect our team, our coaches and the best direction for our team to go. We may differ on how to do the best for our team, but we all agree that we do want the best for our team.

2

Something for some people to think about:
Sitake has been the head coach for four years:
2016 9-4
2017 4-9
2018 7-6
2019 2-3
Edwards record for the first five years:
1972 7-4
1973 5-6
1974 7-3-1
1975 6-5
1976 9-2

Do you see the trending direction? Not sure if the coaches meet up to expectations (realistic or unrealistic).

Second, One thing the Lavell did that Kalani has not done is hire “Experienced” D1 Coordinators (DC, OC). Both when the came to BYU had ZERO experience as DC. Grimes seems to be learning from his mistakes (ever so slowly), but The DC? Not even close, making mistake after mistake.

3

Floyd,

Thanks for your reply and observations.
Following your line of thinking, let me add a bit to it.

BYU has had 13 Head Coaches in its football history.( I MAY HAVE MISSED ONE AS I THOUGHT IT WAS 14 COACHES,)

1.) Alvin Twitchell was the first Head football coach. Under his
leadership. we were beaten 137-3 in our first 3 years. He was also our basketball coach. (Awe the pattern starts at the
beginning)

2.) CJ Hart was our second coach He was only 29 years old with
virtually no experience (Awe, the pattern continues).

3.) G. Ott Romney was our 3rd HC. 42-31-5

4.) Eddie Kimble 4th HC. He was also AD. He was also HC for
Basketball.

5.) Floyd Millett was the 5th HC. He was an assistant coach
before being promoted to HC.

6.) Chick Atkinson 6th HC. He had coaching experience at 3
Idaho High Schools. (Awe, the pattern continues)

7.) Tally Stevens, 7th HC. Experience: Asst coach at BYU, HC
@ East and at Morgan High Schools. After that, he owned
Stevens and Brown Sporting Goods. (Pattern continues)

8.) HAL MITCHELL was our 8th HC.
He was the former UCLA and New York Giants Offensive
Lineman Coach. He brought the experience of being around
two great programs but no HC experience (Starting
to sound very familiar?)

9.) Tommy Hudspeth was our 9th HC. His experience was being
an assistant coach for Oklahoma high schools and the
Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian League. He had no HC
experience.

  1. Lavel Edwards was our 10th HC. His experience was being
    one of Tommy Hudspeth’s assistant coaches.

11.) Gary Crowton was our 11th HC.
Before that his experience was as a former player at
Snow College and Colorado State.

  He was probably the first coach that we ever had with 
  HC experience as he was the HC a Louisiana Tech.  

 He was also on the coaching staff of the Chicago Bears, 
 Georgia Tech, Boston College, New Hampshire, Western 
 Illinois, and Snow College. 

 After leaving BYU, he has been the OC at Oregon, While at 
 Oregon, He was named the National Assistant Coach of The
 Year.

 Next, he was hired by the Defending National Champions, 
 LSU as OC.  

  From there it was Maryland and Southern Utah and what 
  happened next was the continued slide down.  What a shame 
  and waste of talent.

 He was probably the most qualified coach that we ever had. 

 He was the only coach with  HC experience that we ever hired..

  INCLUDING the sex scandals of a few of his players had 
  in the late-night hours in the privacy of their own homes, 
  which this coach was held accountable for, I think that the 
  biggest mistake that he ever made, was having our cougars 
  go to Cal Berkley and on their home field, defeat that proud 
  team by more than 30 humiliating points when our AD was 
  than HC at Cal.  The HC of Cal got fired from being the HC.  

  He, the fired HC of the Cal Team,  was immediately hired at 
  BYU as the new AD.

  Soon after, the sex scandal game.  After taking our cougars to  
  12-0 season, a ranking of #5 in the Nation, and about to crash 
  the BCS bowl, we lost in Hawaii. 

   Minutes before the game started, it was announced that even 
   if we won that game in Hawaii, we would not get a BCS bowl, 
   we lost that game.  What a letdown.

    Our star running back was not in the game due to leg injury, 
    (Luke Stalely)  Our QB had separated shoulders. (Brandon 
    Doman ?)

     Next came the sex scandal of a few players.  Crowton, 
      instead of spending time and mindset on coaching and 
      winning, he had to spend his time and mindset on defending 
      himself as being the coach that recruited these sex 
      offenders. His team went downhill and the X Cal HC that 
       was the new BYU AD fired Crowton.  What a loss that was.

12.) Our 12 HC was Bronco Mendenhall.
His experience was as DC at BYU, and on the coaching staff
at New Mexico, Louisiana Tech, Oregon State, N. Arizona,
Snow College, and Oregon State, all of which were as DC.

    He had great success at BYU in the MWC playing a G5 
   schedule. After leaving BYU, he is finding success as a P5 
   HC  at Va.

13.) Kalani Sitake
Experience:
DC for Oregon State. Utah Utes LB coach.
He played fullback for Lavell Edwards,
He was an asst coach at SUU
One of his hires, for OC, Grimes, was a line coach for LSU
The pattern seems to be that we don’t hire coaches in the
areas that the coaches we hire, have experience coaching.
It is frustrating that the powers that be, will not pay the
required competitive pay, in order to get the experienced
coaches we need, to play against teams that do have the
experienced coached that they need. The results are like
what we see in teams like Utah and Washington locally or
Alabama, Ohio State, ND, and the likes Nationally.

4

My point was not so much the HC experience, it was the Assistants.
Yes, Lavell Edwards coached at Granite high school, where he never won a single game. Hired then by BYU to be the DC. After years of tutlage under Hudspeth, he became the HC.

The very first thing he did was to think outside the box. He knew he could not compete with stellar programs using the kids they had, so he hired Dewey Warren was actually inventor of the so called West Coast Offense.

Then Lavell surrounded himself with great coaches like Holgren, Felt, French, Chow, Scovil, and many many others who were not only experienced but knew how to get the most out of their players.

Edwards as a coach was medicore, but as a HC he was fantastic because he managed the coaches who taught the players how to play, then when there was conflict between coaches and players, he was the one that smoothed the ruffled feathers.

5

RU: You sure sound like our Bishop or Statke President or Mission President. Being in a P-5 is not the highest degree in the Celestial Kingdom. Teams win when they have consistent depth, good coaching and balanced schedules. BYU is missing all three this season. I disagree with you and your post.

6

that would be my assessment as well. At first I took a wait and see approach because I felt that the Defense was left on the field too long in the Utah game. And still to some extent, I think our 3 and outs lead to Defensive fatigue but watching how Iliaki frittered about opportunities in the Toledo game leads me to believe that our DC needs to be helped or let go.

7

I do too. Edwards didn’t play many P-5 type of opponents like we are doing in the Sitaki years. Also, back in LE days they played 11 or 12 games. Not 13 or 14. Who knows what the records would look like in the LE days. Would Scovil’s offense have beaten USC or Tennessee?

8

It’s a shame Sitaki has to be surrounded by alumni like yourself who compare eras like this. LE never played 4 P-5 teams in September. He played 11 game seasons, not 12 or 13. Uggg!

9

this backs up what you are sayin
https://www.heraldextra.com/sports/college/byu/football/dickson-byu-football-once-again-staring-at-college-football-mediocrity/article_4c8e17ad-c025-578a-b43d-710206c38044.html

10

So, are you saying that Lavell only hired OC’s and DC’s who had been OC’s and DC’s before coming to BYU? I know Scovil wasn’t. I don’t think most of the others were either. Chow was working for Scovil. Please prove your statement please :slight_smile:

11

Warren was the OC for Tenneesse, Kansas.
Scovil was a head coach at pacific in the 60’s, he was on the 49er’s staff shortly before coming to BYU. So, yes he had plenty experience to become OC
Chow was on staff at BYU for 20 years before becoming OC, and he worked with the best.

The main point is that all the DC’s and OC’s under Edwards all had multiple years of experience before coming to BYU.

12

LOL… I am not an alumni of BYU Scott… I watch BYU football because I liked what the product Edwards created… Nothing else.

13

I am very sorry for you then :joy:

14

1979, we beat Texas A&M (1st game) on the road. I believe Doug Scofield was on our fb program - OC 1979 & 1980

15

Really? I seem to remember playing Arizona and ASU every year, Pitt, Miami, Baylor, UCLA and many others. He played TCU, Utah, Washington, Cal, Oregon St, and the list goes on.

Funny because there wasn’t a P5 list of schools then. They didn’t exist yet.

16

How many each year? 4? No. One, yes. Unless it was in a bowl too. Pay attention :slight_smile: today, we play 4 or more each year like next year.

17

No, Lavell had 2-3 P5’s per year from 1982 through 1999. And 4 in 2000, his last year when he went 6-6.

18

I would take 2. That’s a good number. They played 11 games and most were league and a few patsies.

Our goal each year is to go to a bowl game. To go to a good bowl, we have to have as few of losses as possible. But, we get too beat up playing 4 and next year 5?

19

Floyd,

Chick Atkinson was head coach at BYU 1949-55. I started he Y 1953-54 school year while on the 1/4 system. He had one winless season and two seasons with only one win each season.

Here’s the kicker:

The very next coach was Hal Kopp. 1956-58.
He was the shot in the arm that BYU needed. He went 13-14-3.
Compared to the winless seasons before, this was great.
HE WAS THE ONLY NON MORMON HEAD COACH TO BE AT BYU EVER.

Next we went back to needing to be LDS to be head coach and we hired Hal Mitchell. He gave us a bit disappointing drop off. 8-22
record.

Next came Tommy Hudspeth, Over 8 years he gave us a record
39-42-1 He brought in the Marines as recruits. He hired Lavel Edwards and the others you mentioned. When he left, he recommended Lavel Edwards to take his place as head coach. You know the story since that time.

It is no secret by now, the Desert News, The Provo Hearld, and KSL Radio in addition to others are all talking about the firing of Kalani at the end of this 5 year contract.

My opinion in this:

It is not gospel that we hire only LDS as head coach.
When we hired Hal Kopp, we were desperately in need of the shot in the arm which he provided. He gave us that shot in the arm.
He was not LDS.

Perhaps, now is the time that we need that backup shot in the arm and hire someone that can get us back on track.

What do you think?

20

texcoug,

Thank you for your reply. I learn as much from those that do not agree with me as I do from those that do agree with me.

If you read the Desert News, KSL Radio, and the Provo Herald today, you will see that I am not alone in my thinking.

It seems that winning games is very, very, very important to each of these outlets.

Thanks for your reply.

Ron