NFL talent on his roster. He needed to go. Prior to 2022, BYU's defense was not that bad. In fact, they were pretty good a couple of those years under Tuiaki. #31 in 2016 and #9 in 2020. You don't fire a defensive coordinator so quickly at a place like BYU when you just had back to back double digit win seasons, and especially when the admin weren't opening up the pocket book. Kalani negotiated a huge pay increase for assistants and then one year later brought in Jay Hill and that entire staff (two of which were candidates to be defensive coordinator).
The tired and completely false statement of Kalani putting his buddies above the program is nonsense. He fired his good buddies Reno Mahe, Tevita Ofenhagaue, Jason AhYou, and even Tuiaki. He's not above firing his buddies. And thankfully he did fire Tuiaki and Lamb. It was time for them to go. But trying to force the statement that Kalani puts his buddies above the program is just stupid.