BYU athletics finished No. 45 in the 2017-18 Learfield Director’s Cup. It’s their worst finish in the last four years.
The 2017-18 athletic season is over, and the final Learfield Director’s Cup standings have been released.
BYU comes in at No. 45 for the season.
The Learfield Director’s Cup ranks college programs based on their overall athletic performance in all sports. Schools get points based on how they finish in a given sport, and those points are totaled to determine the final standings.
Stanford won the cup for a 24th straight year, finishing with 1,448 points. Their national championships in Men’s Soccer, Women’s Soccer, Women’s Swimming, and Women’s Tennis helped them clinch this year’s title.
BYU finishes the athletic season with 552.5 points, finishing a half-point behind No. 44 Nebraska.
Breaking down the Cougars’ points looks like this:
- Women’s Cross Country – 66 points (11th nationally)
- Men’s Cross Country – 85 points (3rd nationally)
- Women’s Volleyball – 64 points (9th nationally)
- Women’s Gymnastics – 52.5 points (19th nationally)
- Men’s Indoor Track & Field – 39.5 points (34th nationally)
- Women’s Indoor Track & Field – 26.5 points (45th nationally)
- Women’s Golf – 39.5 points (33rd nationally)
- Men’s Golf – 49 points (24th nationally)
- Softball – 37.5 points (33rd nationally)
- Men’s Track & Field – 40 points (33rd nationally)
- Women’s Track & Field – 5 points (67th nationally)
- Men’s Volleyball – 55 points (3rd nationally)
BYU’s 45th place finish is their worst since 2014-15, when they finished at No. 48 with 509.75 points.
It’s also the first time since 2014-15 that the Cougars weren’t the top non-Power 5 team in the cup standings. This season BYU finished behind Princeton, who took the No. 40 spot with 579.5 points.
The team that finished better than BYU in 2014-15?
Princeton.
The drop in the cup standings is statistical proof that the Cougar athletic program had a down year. That’s especially true for the men’s program, which only had five teams earn points toward the cup.
At least BYU finished higher than local programs such as Boise State (No. 59), Utah (No. 61), Utah State (No. 78), Southern Utah (No. 91), Gonzaga (No. 113), Weber State (No. 201), and Utah Valley (No. 211).