By Jackson Posey | Sports Writer
On Sept. 10, 1983, Baylor and BYU met for the first time.
Led by head coach LaVell Edwards and a senior gunslinger named Steve Young, the Cougars marched into Floyd Casey Stadium and nearly knocked off Grant Teaff’s Bears. Young threw for 351 yards and a touchdown on 23 for 38 passing and tacked on 113 yards and two scores on the ground. But the eventual Heisman Trophy runner-up fell just short, losing 40-36.
It’s been four decades since that first matchup, and a lot has changed. Edwards won the 1984 AP national championship and is now the namesake of BYU’s stadium. The Cougars left the Western Athletic Conference for greener pastures, a winding path which culminated in their eventual addition to the Big 12. Young left to play in the NFL, where he had a moderately successful career – three Super Bowls, seven Pro Bowls and a Hall of Fame nod.
Young isn’t walking through that door. But for two quarters, Baylor’s defense made BYU redshirt junior quarterback Jake Retzlaff look like the second coming.
Baylor deferred the opening kickoff after winning the coin toss, the first of a series of back-foot choices. Retzlaff marched the offense 75 yards downfield for a commanding touchdown drive, completing all four passes for 69 yards and the score. Baylor only managed one snap before losing a ridiculous tip-drill interception at the line of scrimmage, giving BYU redshirt sophomore wide receiver Chase Roberts perfect a perfect opportunity to go up two scores.
https://twitter.com/Big12Conference/status/1840064740460245239
Redshirt freshman running back Bryson Washington ran the ball three times for seven yards on the ensuing drive, including a two-yard loss on fourth down. With prime field position, Retzlaff took it in himself, securing his first rushing touchdown of the season and putting the Cougars up 21-0 with 3:39 to play in the first quarter.
It isn’t the first time this defense has given up a flurry of early points. In the Bears’ FBS opener, both of Utah’s touchdowns came within 20 seconds of each other in the first quarter; Baylor outscored the Utes 12-6 across the final three frames. A week ago, Colorado won the first quarter but needed a Hail Mary to force overtime after the Bears rallied. And on Saturday, the Cougars scored just three points after flame-throwing their way to a 31-14 halftime lead.
Clearly, the Bears have the talent to lock down opposing teams, but have consistently trotted out defensive units that look slow and unprepared for the first several drives. Which is a problem – especially given the mantra head coach Dave Aranda and others have been parroting all season. That theme clearly traced the postgame press conference, between Aranda and both players who were available to the media postgame.
“That’s what we want our offense to do: Come out, start fast and then finish even stronger,” said head coach Dave Aranda, who later added that, “We learned that our offense can start really fast.”
“I think just starting fast is the first thing” the team needs to improve on, senior tight end Gavin Yates said.
“We’ve got to start that way, we’ve got to start fast,” redshirt senior safety Caleb Parker said after the game.
Parker narrowly foiled a trick play late in the first quarter, deflecting a pass from wide receiver Parker Kingston, but it didn’t matter — BYU scored their third touchdown of the game on the next play. Retzlaff played a first half for the ages, completing 13 of 18 passes for 180 yards passing and two touchdowns and rushing four times for 47 yards and another score.
Retzlaff, while clearly talented, isn’t a world-beater. He didn’t claim the starting quarterback role from transfer (and familiar face) Gerry Bohanon until opening day. He completed just half of his 125 attempts last season for a sub-100 passer rating. The last time he played a road game against a Power 4 team, he completed 53.9% of his passes for 202 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions against SMU on Sept. 6. Against Baylor, he looked unstoppable.
As the game stretched on, BYU began to lose ground. Touchdowns on the team’s first four drives gave way to a rare punt, followed by two field goals — and then the wheels fell off. The Cougars failed to score on their final six drives, as Baylor’s defense finally locked in and locked up.
https://twitter.com/ByJacksonPosey/status/1840162302688948253
Interception. Missed field goal. Punt. Interception. Punt. Kneel down.
The momentum shift was just too little, too late. The Bears have outscored all five of their opponents in the final three quarters of regulation, by a combined 64 points, but slow starts have been killer against Big 12 foes. Utah, Colorado and Utah have outscored Baylor in the first quarter by a combined 45-10 margin; the Bears lost all three games by an average of eight points.
https://twitter.com/ByJacksonPosey/status/1840170516621275355
Baylor sits at 2-3 heading into October not because of a talent deficiency, but because of a patent inability to do the very thing they’ve been harping on all season: starting fast. Talk is cheap; another press conference touting truth-telling and the inevitable success of the party line won’t win anyone over.
Saying the “right things” doesn’t matter anymore when there’s nothing else to say. The staff can keep shouting “We need to start fast” into the void as much as they want; until they actually do it, and stop stumbling out of the blocks, even the prettiest of mantras are just cheap drivel.
It’s been almost two calendar years since Baylor beat a conference foe at home. Junior students have only seen the Bears beat one Big 12 team at McLane Stadium, and that was a win over Kansas’ backup quarterback in 2022.
The time for talk is over ‑ it’s time to put up or shut up. The future of the program depends on it.
