BYU Football: Why the sky is not falling on the Cougars season

While last night’s 35-20 loss to the aggies was no doubt a crushing blow to BYU’s playoff and New Year’s Day bowl hopes, all hope is not lost on the season. BYU still has much to play for going forward, and has the pieces to make this a great season. Here are five reasons why the sky is not falling on BYU Football.

1. Christian Stewart

There’s no way to replace an athlete like Taysom Hill. He’s a world class athlete and on of the best players in college football. BYU’s offense revolved around him and will have to undergo a big shift going forward. Christian Stewart is no slouch though. Looking at his performance in fall camp and accolades he received during his time at Snow College, this BYU offense can still perform at a high level. Stewart has a big arm and showed a great touch on the deep ball during camp. BYU showed in the second half that their not afraid to let Stewart loose and take some shots downfield. As Stewart gets reps more with the offense during practice, I expect him to settle into his role and lead a formidable BYU offense.

2. Jamaal Williams

ATTENTION: BYU still has one of the best running backs in school history on its roster. Let us not forget that Jamaal ran over 1200 yards last year and is averaging nearly 100 yards a game this year. Jamaal probably has been a bit under-utilized this season, but that surely will not be the case going forward. Expect the Cougars to feed Jamaal the rock and get him at least 25 carries a game. Jamaal is an elite talent at running back, and will get the chance to be let loose and show he can perform as the focal point of an offense.

3. Robert Anae

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Robert Anae has seen a lot of different quarterbacks during his coaching career. He has tailored his offense to every quarterback he has coached. During his first stint at BYU, he had pocket passers John Beck and Max Hall, both who enjoyed great success under his watch. While that was a different offense, Anae also has seen pocket passers in the offense he was running now. While the offensive line coach at Arizona, he saw Nick Foles run Rich Rodriguez’s offense at a high level. This BYU offense has taken many concepts from Rodriguez’s offense, a offense where pocket passers and running backs can both excel. Expect Anae to take a lot of concepts from that 2011 Arizona offense as well as concepts from his time working with Beck and Hall.

4. Bronco Mendenhall

This BYU defense has been exposed the past 3 games, and it completely fell apart against the Aggies. Whether that is due to Bronco relinquishing play-calling duties to Nick Howell this season, or the departure of players such as Kyle Van Noy, something needs to be fixed. Bronco is a defensive guru, and will undoubtedly be putting hours this week into fixing his defense. Whatever Bronco decides to fix, he has the track record that shows he has the ability to turn around this defense into the BYU defenses we have been accustomed to seeing under his watch

5. The Schedule

While the October schedule is still tricky, it is not a murderer’s row schedule by any means. UCF has been struggling, Nevada is improved, but is still Nevada, and Boise State got handled by Air Force. All 3 are losable games, but are certainly winnable as well. The only November game of note is the season finale at Cal, a team that will tear up BYU’s defense if things are not shored up before then. However, if BYU plays up to its potential and shores up a few things, there is no reason BYU can’t get through those three games with a 3-1 mark. That would put the Cougars at 10-2 for the season, a mark which most had as a goal at the beginning of the season.

What are your thoughts Cougar Nation? Is there still hope for BYU this season? Or are the Cougars done with the loss of Taysom and a suspect defense? Leave a comment or let us know on twitter/facebook pages!