Last year I was devastated. Kentucky came in and got Pope from us and Robinson, Saunders, Chandler, Hall, Khalifa and Waterman (Waterman and Khalifa were a little bit later in the cycle) were all in the portal. Really it seemed like the end of an era of BYU basketball before it really got going.

I mean Pope achieved two "6" seed rankings in 5 years. And his best year we didn't even get to count (that team was really good). After the end of the Dave Rose era that was a huge positive for the program. Even during the Dave Rose era he only achieved a 6 seed or higher one time and that was with Jimmer.

So while we knew Pope wasn't the perfect coach (he lost twice as a 6 seed which is not good in the tournament), he was a good one and was taking his recruits with him. Speculation immediately broke out over whether we wanted Burgess or Madsen (and I wasn't really excited by either).

Then someone out of seemingly nowhere mentioned we were getting Kevin Young. I didn't believe it. Why would this coach who was on the cusp of getting an NBA head coaching gig come to BYU? When official news broke I was elated. Young would have to "rebuild" BYU, but he was a good coach.

Then Coach Young went to work. He hired the best staff BYU has ever had by a large margin. He convinced Saunders and Hall to stay. We started hearing rumblings about Coach Young going after the best recruits in the class. Heck he was getting AJ Dybantsa to listen to him? We googled AJ Dybantsa. We then heard about international contacts and are attention turned overseas only to find out Coach Young got future lottery pick Egor Demin to come. We picked up Keita. He signed Kanon Catchings away from Purdue and eventually added Boskovic. It was incredible, Coach Young with the help of his brother was immediately the best recruiter we have ever had.

Then the season started. Demin looked good against bad teams but overall we just looked OK. Guys didn't know what they were doing defensively. Some didn't know their role offensively. We won against cupcakes, but lost a 2 OT game to Ole Miss and then were blown out at Providence. Conference started and we lost close games to TCU, Texas Tech and Utah. Things weren't quite clicking.

Coach Young made some changes to the starting lineup and to roles. He moved Hall and Catchings to the bench and brought in Mag and Knell. The team was immediately better. Over the next 2 months and 16 final games including the conference tournament against very tough competition we went 13-3.

But now the real test. BYU in the NCAA tournament had made 2 Sweet Sixteens in the previous 50 years. They had not upset a higher seed since 1991 and had not even been to the round of 32 since Jimmer. Round one comes and is competitive for about 14 minutes and then BYU takes over. The final score of 80-71 doesn't really reflect the game play as BYU led by 9+ the entire 2nd half (and it was usually much larger). Yes, the 10 year curse is over! Coach Young did what Pope never could do in winning a single tournament game.

Round 2 comes round and we play Wisconsin. We are not expected to win. Instead we come out firing on all cylinders. Despite some terrible officiating against us we go into half time up 11 points. The 2nd half comes around and the other team is making more shots. Some inexplicable horrible fouls including a technical and flagrant 2 go against us. This is when BYU in the tournament folds up shop and we blame it on biased officiating. Nope. BYU played well enough and a huge end of game defensive sequence nets us the victory. Again our first lower seeded tournament victory in 34 years. Our 3rd Sweet Sixteen in the last 50 years.

Tomorrow we write another chapter...hopefully our first Elite 8 since 1981 (half of the board was probably not alive since 1981). But regardless about how it turns out, what a year for Coach Young! He has already surpassed even the craziest of expectations for him when he arrived. Oh I completely forgot to mention he landed the #1 and #30ish (it keeps changing) recruit of the 2025 class. While you never know who will be here or not, in all likelihood the 2025-26 roster will be the most talented to ever compete at BYU. That is a crazy thing to say and like I said we don't know for sure yet, but i think the chances are good.

Thank you BYU and Coach Young! It has been an incredible ride!