University Park, Texas • Tom Holmoe was sprinting down a staircase, weaving in and out of dejected SMU fans, when he was briefly stalled on the third floor.
A group of fans were pouring out from a suite — trying to make sense of an 18-15 game where there were more turnovers, six, than touchdowns, two. When they saw BYU’s athletic director walking by, they figured they’d ask him for his take.
His response?
“Your kicker might be the best player I’ve ever seen,” he said in all seriousness.
He then put his head down, resumed his beeline for BYU’s locker room and vanished into the underbelly of Gerald J. Ford Stadium. He was more than happy to escape from Dallas — physically and metaphorically — with a win. He’d take the Cougars first road victory in 356 days anyway it came — even if it did somehow come down to out-dueling a kicker.
“We’ll have to find an answer, find a way to get efficient in all three phases. ... I don’t want anyone to feel like they should be patting themselves on the back,” head coach Kalani Sitake said, shaking his head. “But I like the way we found a way to win this game.”
Sitake probably won’t have to worry too much about his team thinking everything was perfect. Friday night’s win was no statement. More accurately, the Cougars survived this game, which was an unpleasant chorus of errors and offensive struggles.
BYU’s offense committed three turnovers and had six three-and-outs. Its run game was mostly on life support throughout the night, averaging under 4 yards a carry.
SMU was equally head scratching. It had two turnovers inside the 10-yard line and couldn’t find a way to escape the Cougars’ steady stream of pressure.
The teams traded turnovers in the fourth quarter with BYU up 15-12. SMU quarterback Kevin Jennings started the exchange, throwing an interception to Marque Collins in the red zone at the 3-yard line. Three plays later, BYU quarterback Jake Retzlaff threw his own pick that gifted the ball right back inside the 5. And three plays after that, SMU running Brashard Smith put the ball on the ground for a fumble.
Somehow, the score remained the same after three chances to crack the game open.
“That’s what kind of game it was, and now you have to make a play,” Collins said. “I think we made a lot [of plays] on defense tonight.”
Which made it seem like it would come down to SMU’s kicker.
As both teams kept stalling out, SMU’s Collin Rogers kept drilling kicks. He tied a school record with five made field goals in a single game. With under five minutes in the fourth quarter, SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee all but gave up on trying to go for it even with his offense even inside the 10-yard line.
He instead called on Rogers to tie the game with his leg, and he got it done to make it a 15-15 game.
“My goodness, this guy was automatic,” Sitake said. “He even kicked into the wind on some deep balls. I mean, if we didn’t know much about him before, we do now. He made them all and we missed one. And he was a huge weapon for them.”
It became BYU’s offense against Rogers’ leg. Unconventional? Yes. Especially for two teams that came in averaging over 40 points a game.
But BYU found enough in the waning minutes to win. On the final drive of the game, BYU went for a fourth down and 1 at the 48-yard line.
Retzlaff took the snap and pitched it to running back Miles Davis. The Cougars’ fourth running back of the night popped loose for a 37-yard run to the SMU 15. It led to BYU’s game-winning field goal and a sense of relief that the Cougars could hop on the plane and get a win out of an unconventional night.
“Gritty, very gritty game,” Retzlaff said. “Defensively, got it done. Offensively, getting it done when it needed to be done. ... Played good enough to walk away with a win.”
BYU might’ve wanted to make this game a statement win. It was the Cougars’ first matchup against a Power Four team in 2024. In year two of BYU’s Big 12 era, they wanted to show they’d made improvements before opening conference play with Kansas State in two weeks.
“Especially looking online, people talking bad about us ,” linebacker Isaiah Glasker said.
At the end of the day, BYU won’t call this win a statement. It was too sloppy for that. But on the flight home to Provo, BYU will realize it didn’t need a statement so much as a win.
In its chase to get to a bowl game, stealing a road victory as an 11-point underdog will pay dividends. Getting back into the road win column after five straight losses will pay dividends. Just learning how to win again — especially for a team that might be favored to win in just three more games this year — can pay off, too.
“This game, in the past, we’ve been down when we had turnovers. Guys hung their heads in the past,” Sitake said. “Now the guys are fighting through it.”
Holmoe knows that more than anybody.
So statement or not, smiling about the odd kicker’s duel or not, Holmoe could vanish into the night happily Friday.
He knows, just as he was trying to get out of there as fast as he could, BYU should take it and run.