BYU Football: Turnovers and two other keys to beating Cal

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TUCSON, AZ – SEPTEMBER 01: Wide receiver Talon Shumway #21 of the Brigham Young Cougars is unable to catch a pass defended by cornerback Lorenzo Burns #2 of the Arizona Wildcats during the first half of the college football game at Arizona Stadium on September 1, 2018 in Tucson, Arizona. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images) /

Mistake Free Football

Now this isn’t quite a fair goal. Nobody plays mistake free football.

But the Cougars certainly need to cut down on the miscues from Week 1.

It’s widely accepted that teams make the biggest improvements between Week 1 and Week 2, and there’s one area where BYU desperately needs to see that improvement.

Penalties.

The Cougars played a relatively clean game against Arizona. They didn’t turn the ball over on offense, and they didn’t allow big plays on defense. That’s how you win football games against teams on your level or worse.

But if you want to beat a team that’s better than you, you have to avoid costly penalties, as well as miscommunications and blown plays.

Against Arizona, the Cougars had 10 penalties for 94 yards. They need to cut that in half if they’re going to knock off teams like Boise State and Utah, and have a fighting chance against teams like Wisconsin and Washington.

There were multiple miscommunications on both sides of the ball as well. There was a missed handoff by Tanner Mangum, and a couple of missed routes in the passing game. On defense, a blown coverage gave the Wildcats their first touchdown of the game.

These are things that can be cleaned up, and there’s no better time to do that than this week, before they have to travel to Wisconsin next week and try to play the role of giant-slayers.

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