Speaker 1: It's time to celebrate the greatest team sport known to man,
where modern day gladiators collide for all the glory on
the gridire Let's talk some college football on Cougar Sports
with Ben Krittle.
Speaker 2: Welcome back Cougar Sports. One of three nine ninety eight
point three ESBA the Fan. I've been Crittle broadcasting from
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It is time for my favorite segment called football segment.
We're going to celebrate the win over Utah, and I
want to ask this question in this segment. Is that
Utah team that is comprised of some very talented football
players NFL draft picks. You know Kleb Lomu, Spencer Fonnod
both probably going to be first round NFL draft picks.
At tackle, you have Smith Snowdon NFL defensive back Taylor Johnson. Like,
go down the list of high level football players for Utah.
Speaker 3: It's a good football team.
Speaker 2: And they have good coaches as well well resourced. Is
that Youtah team that BYU just beat, the same Youtah
team that has been winning in the Pac twelve for
the last few decades. The same type of team that
wins ten plus games and goes to bowl games every
year and goes to Rose Bowl games and then loses
those games. You know, is there on the cusp of
elite to great greatness but struggles to get over that hump.
And I would conclude that they are. They're just in
a better conference now. But to talk about it, to
discuss it, it's going to be It's going to be
a former BYU wide receiver to break it all down.
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Speaker 2: All right, let's welcome in Jared Bledsoe of Utah Protective
Films from a BYU wide receiver to discuss the topic
of the day.
Speaker 3: Jared, how thatck? Are you good? Really well? And thanks
for having me. Ben.
Speaker 2: It's always great to to just celebrate the win over
the rival foe, the University of Utah.
Speaker 3: Break this down for me.
Speaker 2: What do you think is this this Utah football team
that BYU just beat on their home field?
Speaker 3: Is that the same team? Right?
Speaker 2: Is that the same type of team talent wise, coaching,
staff wise, resource wise that was dominating the PAC twelve
and BYUS just surpassed them.
Speaker 4: I think you're going down the right path on it,
you know. I think that they every year Utah has
some NFL quality guys, guys that get picked up, guys.
Speaker 3: They've been putting guys in the league for a long time.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's what they needed in order to be
successful in the PAC twelve, I think. And if you
if you look at some of the BA Utah game
and it kind of analyzed some of their their strengths.
Their offensive line really good and and in fact, I
think they played really well still against BYU. But what
they lacked is that our DB's outplayed their receivers. So
you got this number one offensive line in the nation,
who's who gave the quarterback way more time than he
needed on a ton of plays. I mean, we couldn't
get to him. And then when we did a sides
that move around a lot more time. Yeah, but he
couldn't find anybody downfield open. So that's where I think
They've got some superstars in different areas, but they don't
have enough to fill those voids. Just like I don't
think they had a receiver that was dominant enough that
they had a go to guy that could get open
every time, or they would have hit that guy on
a lot of those places. But I think you're down
the right path on it. I think you guys are
always going to be a very good team. They're always
going to have good players, good coaching. They have the
means to do it. But on the other hand, was
the Pac twelve what the Big twelve twelve is today?
Speaker 2: Utah the team that was the odds on favor to
win the Big twelve last year, didn't even go to
a bowl game, had the physical you know, smash in
the in the mouth that they did not expect. Getting
into the Big twelve Pac twelve, they were the most
physical team in the conference more often than not, even
versus the likes of Washington and Oregon and USC they
typically got out athleted.
Speaker 3: In those seeds from those guys.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, more so than they did get out physical.
So offensive and defensive line trench warfare is what they
want at they move up to the Big twelve, not
as dominant as they were in the Pac twelve in
my opinion. And look, they're a good team this year.
This is arguably a better team. There's a reason why
Kyle Whittingham came back an additional year. He did not
retire after last year. He saw the talent on this
football team returning and felt like they could compete and
win in the Big twelve.
Speaker 3: And they have.
Speaker 2: But they've also lost a tough one on the road
to their rival, and they.
Speaker 3: Lost at home to Texas Tech.
Speaker 2: And there's parody in Culge football.
Speaker 3: We know that, but.
Speaker 2: I think they're the same team and BYU has just
surpassed them, and it hasn't taken them that long to
surpass them since arriving in the Big twelve. And we're
only at a half share right now. By the way,
we're not even at that full share yet or revenue distribution, right.
Speaker 4: But do you hear Aaron Rodercks that he was on
the coordinator's corner, right, and he he had made They
were talking about the quality of our recruiting and how
we were always a little bit behind Utah back during
that streak when Utah won the nine nine in row.
Speaker 3: We they had better talent, right.
Speaker 4: His comment was, we have better talent now, you know,
and and and and we're recruiting better talent and we're
starting to see you know, it's it's not uncommon to
flip through Instagram and you come across one of those
top top ten, top thirty recruits and there's Alabama, Auver
and all these different schools, and then there's BYU over
in the left corner, you know, as one of the visits.
Speaker 3: And you didn't see that before.
Speaker 4: You didn't see these big time recruits with their Alabamas
and their SEC schools to visit and then BYU. You know,
so I think it is it is proving. The formula
that that Kilani and his coaches are together is proving
to be successful and it's just going to get better.
Speaker 2: So then what do you attribute the increase in recruiting to?
What do you attribute you know, the the turning of
the tides. That's what we're talking about here. We're talking
about the turning of the tides and the rivalry. Three
in a row, now, okay, that's that's a streak baby.
And look, I know Utah had nine in a row,
but they also had we had unequal footing.
Speaker 3: We did not.
Speaker 2: We did not have the same resources, We didn't have
the power for affiliation. Uh, they have never had an
honor code. The student athletes of the University of Utah
from what I've been told there, their academic riggers are
not nearly as stringent as the academic riggers of YU.
All those things can lead to better recruiting.
Speaker 4: So what do you see, well, b Yu, I think
where we turned the corner, obviously is when we got
a conference, When we got into the Big.
Speaker 3: Twelve, it changed.
Speaker 4: The prospects outlook on what's possible at BYU. It before that,
when we were independent, Yeah, we got to pick our
schedule a little bit, and we kind of got to
bounce around. But you had to win out almost to
get a chance to play in any kind of a
playoff or any kind of a big bowl game. And
so it was like one loss and it was now
where are we at? You know, Liberty Bowl Holiday ball?
Speaker 3: You know what? Those maybe better balls now.
Speaker 4: But you know, maybe when you look back at it,
it was it's different. So you've got players that are
coming in.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: I was in the stands and I spent some time
with some of the players parents during the game Utah,
and you know, and I asked those questions, you know what,
what what brought your son here? You know, and and
what's keeping him here? Yeah, and that was it's it.
You need both.
Speaker 2: You need the acquisition and then you need the rew nowadays, yeah,
you have to keep them, keep them to.
Speaker 3: Develop them in your system.
Speaker 4: The mom that I spoke with, I will keep the
players out of it, but she said, the atmosphere here
what Kalani brings, and just you have to try to
get in trouble in provo. You know, it doesn't just
come to you. You don't just hang out at the
wrong proactively seeking trouble, you know, to get it, and
so at parents I think are seeing more and more
of that. I think they see that this team, the
team stays together in the office, you always are going
to lose some there's just no way around it in
this day and age with nil and the transfer portal.
But we retain a lot of players year to year
that have opportunities to potentially make more money outside, but
they come back and I think that gets noticed, and
not just the players, but but from the parents as well,
and then just a feeling of being here and playing
for Kilonie.
Speaker 3: I think Colonie has done a great I've been.
Speaker 4: Building that network and I think we're going to continue
to see a lot of higher profile guys coming out.
I was talking with Justin Anderson on Saturday before the game,
and you know, they had seventy recruits and families at
the Bautahay.
Speaker 3: Wow, Yeah, I was that is. I was like, man,
you got a huge load to deal with today.
Speaker 4: Seventy recruits with all their families and this was all
the biggest recruits were there for this game.
Speaker 3: And what an atmosphere, you know, I mean, think about it.
Speaker 4: How many stadiums out there are full to the end
of the game, no matter what. You know, you look
at some of the games that we've played this year,
and I know Arizona had a rain delay, but it
wasn't even close to full before the raindo lay, you know,
and then after it was even worse. And then you
look at these stands some of these games as teams
are getting blown out or they're blowing out the other team,
and their fans just leave, you know, and all of
a sudden, it's it's towards the middle of the fourth
cornering and there's like fifteen hundred fans still.
Speaker 3: They're like baus.
Speaker 4: Fans stay for the game, you know, and and enjoy
the game, and they're riled up for the whole game.
And what an atmosphere that is. And having you know,
been recruited or being a recruit now and coming into
that atmosphere and seeing that and hearing and feeling it
and then come out with the win and just the
whole atmosphere. There had to be some guys leaving that
weren't by you guys that that have have them in
their top three now, I really think so.
Speaker 3: I think they did a really good job of bringing
in the guys at the right time. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean, look, there were Utah commits in the locker
room post game, Yeah, celebrating with the BAYU football team.
Speaker 3: So I went, there's a few flops I'm waiting for.
Speaker 4: I think there's some coming that that the guys that
have signed with Utah that that, and I'm not going
to say they admitted, have committed, yeah, committed, Yeah, you
haven't signed yet committed to Utah. Who are going to
look at their opportunities at BYU.
Speaker 3: I think there's more to that than.
Speaker 5: To come here in the near feature ap Andrew Peterson, Well,
while we're talking about recruits, if we're looking at this
year's seniors for BYU, these are the recruits BYU was
getting as independents, right, yep.
Speaker 6: And the recruiting classes are only getting better. We're starting
to get the big twelve guys and like fall Toss Talkswila,
he's a big twelve recruit and he's showing up big time.
And so I hate to bring that up this question
for the sake of my Utah friends, but are we
going to see a talent gap going the other way?
Speaker 3: It?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean that's what it was before, even in
your era in the nineties, eighties and nineties.
Speaker 3: I mean, that's what it was.
Speaker 2: I mean the talent, the best LDS talent, the best
Polynesian talent, and the.
Speaker 3: Best a lot of the best quarterbacks.
Speaker 2: That weren't getting recruited to the Michigan's, the Ohio States,
you know, the Miami's, the USC's, you know at that
time in that era, right like, they were coming to
b YU because they wanted to throw the freaking football.
Speaker 3: They wanted to throw it.
Speaker 2: And so you got a lot of really good premiere
obviously NFL talent to come to Provo at that time,
and there was a significant talent gap until the nineties
when coach McBride took over and started stealing a few
of those guys and creating.
Speaker 3: A great coach. By the way, he.
Speaker 2: Created a similar Lavelle Kalani culture there, and it was
cool to be at Utah and you'd have a chip
on your shoulder, and it bags the question. Right, you're
talking about Kilani here and the brand, and you listen
to the postgame press conferences of Kyle Whittingham and in
Kilanie and they're completely the opposite. And if you're a player, granted,
when you're winning, it's a whole lot easier to be
from him all behind and christening. But who does Who
do you want to play for? Who do you want
to play well?
Speaker 4: And I think there's there's a little limbo going on
with with Utah because when when is he going to retire? Uh?
Speaker 3: Is it going to be the end of this year?
You know?
Speaker 4: I I think he should have retired last year, you know.
Speaker 3: But that's a hard one to go out on. I
get it, you know.
Speaker 2: I hope they make a Bowl game so that he
can feel comfortable. Like I said, he saw the talent.
He's like, we can win with this team. Yeah, we
can win with this team.
Speaker 4: But the drive, the fire isn't there the fire that
I've always seen with with with coach Waitningham.
Speaker 3: I don't see it.
Speaker 2: You know what what extinguished it? It's it's not even
just the rivalry game. I'm telling what it is. It's
it's nil, it's transfer portal, it's buy in from donors.
There's an aging donor population up at the U. And yeah,
they because you're a commuter school. When they're there, they're fans.
It's kind of an as U feel sure they're fans
and they'll show up and they're going to party, pregame
and postgaming, Like yeah, I like, but I don't know
if they have robust buy in from their alumni base
to sustain and I competitive nature of the top twenty five,
you know, top thirty five programs of the country that
ultimately it necessitates to stay there because they've been there
because of X, Y and Z competing in the PAC twelve,
having the resources that they've never had before.
Speaker 3: With the TV money.
Speaker 2: They're not there anymore though, Like now they're on equal
footing with a lot of these other programs and they
don't have the nil to to keep them in the
top thirty five, Top forty year.
Speaker 3: And in year out, or at least they're teetering there.
Speaker 2: It's not a foregone conclusion that they're invested. And I
think wits like, well, he's already declared it. It's his thesis,
like the more you pay, the more you win. He
went on record in regards to Texas Technic. That's his
low hanging for. That's what he's saying, like that's all
it takes. And he's calling out his own donor base.
He's calling out his nil donor base there and he
doesn't like any he doesn't like the variables involved.
Speaker 3: Is the same reason why Nick Saban.
Speaker 4: Got yeah, No, I think I think that the older
generation of coaches are seeing the riding on the wall
as to the changes that are being made within the
n C double A. And if you're not willing to
change and just jump into that cycle, now you can't survive,
you know. And so either you get out you change,
or or you're you start to fall back. And you know,
you mentioned the fans. I don't know about you, but
were you surprised at how little Red was in the stadium?
Now I get it. Tickets more expensive, right, yeah, And I.
Speaker 2: Mean, look, b y U fans, they don't They're pretty strategic.
These are smart, well, I shared fans that know that
when they sell their tickets, they do not put them
on the free market.
Speaker 3: So that you tough fans tickets on the free market.
Speaker 4: So for me for so for from what you were
saying is and and what when we saw we expect
that were ten to twenty percent of this fan base
is in the CRA that's going to be from Utah.
And when we were we're like, you know, I I
think I think Portland State had almost the same amount.
Speaker 3: They had a pretty good.
Speaker 4: Turnout in that same sliver corner of the north end zone.
And and so I was, yeah, I don't, I don't know.
You you may be on onto something with the fan base.
Not they're not by u's fan base, you know, but
nobody travels like BAU, you know. And and because we've
got fans everywhere that are church related and whatnot. And
but you know, just to jump back to the game
real quick, something that I a couple of things that
I that stood out to me that I hadn't really
paid as much attention to. But one one was the
pocket presence of bear bachmer on undred percent has improved.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I.
Speaker 4: Mean just his ability to step up to make a move,
but then the decision making.
Speaker 3: I mean there were there were two specific plays.
Speaker 4: One was a hand off to LJ where he had
shifted LG to one side and then hurried and shifted
him right back and handed the ball.
Speaker 3: LG ran for like thirteen yards and it was like
he saw it change the play and moved him over.
Speaker 4: And then the one went with to Preston Rex, you
know that it was that was the third read was
the president. If you weren't paying attention to that, it
looked like that was the play call.
Speaker 3: And then you go watch it and he goes one
to two to three and throws.
Speaker 4: It and it Yeah, and I'm ready to see a
little bit more Preston, you know, get him in the
open field.
Speaker 3: He's finally healthy.
Speaker 2: You saw he's more accelerated, accelerative, he's he's more explosive.
Speaker 3: He's faster than what he was even a week ago.
Speaker 4: And I think a Ron's gonna find some ways to
get him the ball in open space.
Speaker 3: He's not the brute. He's not gonna you know, running
through the tackles in the guard.
Speaker 4: Get Yeah, he get him on that outside and and yeah,
and LJ made a great block on that that run in.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that was one day.
Speaker 4: And then and then our secondary, I mean our I
was so impressed. But he's gotta playing man almost the
entire game. And they could lock down to where Dan
Pierre was having such a hard time finding somebody open,
and he had plenty of time, you know, and and uh,
and then you know he'd scramble and have to get
laid out and throw it away and take a pic
here and you know. So I was just impressed by
by those stats. I was happy to see us get
out of there without any major injuries and and uh,
you know, no targeting calls, and yeah.
Speaker 3: It was a fun game. It's fun to see.
Speaker 4: I don't feel like there's gonna be quite the letdown
that we had last year after the Utah game because
the energy even as as a being at the stadium
and leaving after the energy, you didn't feel drained like
last year leaving you were like, wow, I don't even
know if I can get up tomorrow. You know, it
was it was draining. So this year, I think we're
gonna be in a better state. And but we got
a difficult, difficult battle ahead and one game at a time,
let's see where we go.
Speaker 2: Jared bled Show, former b YU wide receiver, owner operator
of Utah Protective Films.
Speaker 3: You top Protected Films, Like, what services do you provide there?
Speaker 2: And what discounts can you provide to our listeners that
are tuning in?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so anybody who mentions ESPN the fan Ben Krittle,
we will give you fifteen percent off of any of
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Speaker 4: It's it's myself, Jaden and Jacob or are the guys
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for you.
Speaker 3: One quick shout out. We've got a for our third
grade flag or tackle football team. This week.
Speaker 4: We have got a playoff game against Mountain beyond Saturday
if we are undefeated. If we beat them, we go
to the final championship game the following week. So we're
going defensive coordinator. You know, nobody's scored more than seven
points in a game against us, So let's.
Speaker 2: Go, Oh big, Jeff, let's show Utah Protective Films mentioned
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Cougar Sports on one oh three nine ninety eight point three.
Speaker 5: Yeah,