BYU football: Cougars lose recruits Jaren Kump, David Fotu to Utah Utes

BYU football lost to Boise State on Friday, then got more bad news on Sunday. Talented recruits Jaren Kump and David Fotu flipped from the Cougars to the Utah Utes.

To describe BYU football as anything other than a bit of a mess would be inaccurate at this point. The Cougars have one win on the year – over an FCS team.

As this year’s team continues to struggle, the recruiting scene has the potential to become volatile for the Cougars.

After all, while Kalani Sitake is a talented recruiter, it’s tough to sell an 18-year-old on BYU football when the team is shellacked on a weekly basis.

We have no way of knowing what led to Jaren Kump’s and David Fotu’s decisions to flip, but we can be sure of two things: Firstly, it hurts BYU football. Secondly, the Utes got better.

I cover Utah high school football in a freelance role for Provo newspaper The Daily Herald. In week one, I got to watch Kump, Fotu and Herriman High School first hand. The three-star OL recruit man-handled opponents in the trenches.

He’s every bit of 6-foot-5 and nearly 270-pounds. He looked athletic, strong and had good footwork.

Fotu was equally impressive. Playing defensive end and tight end, Fotu showed flashes of athleticism. Plus he has great size at 6-foot-7.

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Kump told the Deseret News the duo made their decisions while visiting for the Utah vs Stanford game last weekend.

When it comes to high school kids committing to a university, the first thought is always with the kid. They have a future and goals to prepare for, so you always want them to be in the spot they think they’ll be most successful in.

All this does is show that BYU football still has a long way to go to out-recruit Utah for in-state talent consistently.

BYU’s 2018 recruiting class is 57th in 247Sports composite rankings after the two flips.