BYU coach Kalani Sitake isn’t worried about proving his team isn’t a one-hit-wonder.
“Think we’re worried about last year? We’re going on this year right now,” Sitake said at his weekly press conference Monday. “I don’t think there’s anything to prove from last year. We’ve moved on to this year already. And guys are just focusing on trying to perform their best against Arizona. That’s the focus.”
The Cougars are set to kick off the 2021 season on Saturday against Arizona in Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. Although the Cougars won’t be trying to change anyone’s minds about what they were able to accomplish last season, the players are not impervious to the chatter about their record and schedule from a season ago. So, they’re using it as motivation, running back Tyler Allgeier said.
“Obviously we lost a lot of notable players, but I think we got the pieces to the puzzle and we’ll be ready for the game,” Allgeier said.
How will those pieces line up? Less than a week before his team’s season begins, Sitake released the Cougars’ first depth chart of the year Monday.
Strikingly, there weren’t that many “or” denotations among starting positions.
On offense, there are just two starting positions that could be decided game-day: at running back, where Allgeier and Lopini Katoa should split carries, and at one of the three wide receiver positions, where there is a starting battle between brothers Samson and Puka Nacua. Sitake and coaches have previously said Puka Nacua was on a limited availability during fall camp, but Sitake said he expects the Washington transfer to play on Saturday.
The defense also saw two positions labeled as “or”: either Max Tooley or Ben Bywater could start at rover, and at nickel there is a position battle between Jakob Robinson and Caleb Christensen. And, if needed, the special teams will play either Britton Hogan or Austin Riggs as the long-snapper on punts and place kicks.
Sitake said there weren’t a lot of surprises when making the depth chart — coaches had a good idea of how the depth chart would fill out.
“These are guys that we knew would be in the mix,” Sitake said. “There’s a few ‘ors’ in there, but we feel good about the guys who are going to play.”
With the exception of Brayden Cosper, who last week Sitake said had suffered a season-ending injury, there were no other major injury updates to report, according to the head coach.
Of course, there are some smaller, nagging injuries some of his players may be dealing with, but that has no impact on the depth chart.
Everything — and everyone — is on track for Saturday’s game.
“Everyone on the depth chart, I expect to play,” Sitake said. “So, if they’re not on the depth chart, then they’ve probably got some nagging injuries. But it’s football — nagging injuries are part of the game. There’s a difference between hurt and injured. If they’re injured, they’re not able to perform. Hurt, they’ve just got to get over it and deal with some of the pain. No one’s going to be 100% during football season.”
