The final whistle has blown on what was an unforgettable season for BYU football.
No one believed this team was equipped to challenge the Big 12 gauntlet they were scheduled to face. The topic has been beaten half to death by now, but preseason polls listing the Cougars finishing 13th of 16 conference members is inexplicable in hindsight, but perfectly logical on its publish date.
Fresh off an ugly 5-7 campaign in their first season as a power conference member, Kalani Sitake's football program was preemptively dubbed fortunate if they could reach bowl eligibility. Now, standing tall at 11 wins, with multiple wins over ranked opponents (and dominant wins at that), who can deny that these Cougs are in peak form?
The team's 11th win and season capper was an authoritative 36-14 romp over Big 12 regular season co-champion Colorado in the Alamo Bowl. A battle against the football version of the Kardashians would see BYU lead from start to finish, leading by as many as 27 points before the Buffaloes, Travis Hunter, and the Sanders family broke onto the scoreboard.
In many ways, this 11th victory was the perfect encapsulation of who this team is and has been all year. They overcame the media's paper tiger countless times. In no uncertain terms, BYU football has arrived, and this is a different program than we saw a year ago.
Even as the ESPN broadcast entered the game uninformed and unprepared for a competitive BYU side, the Cougars entered this finale with a message to share, a tone to set, and a football game to win.
Sure, they entered this game as odds-on underdogs. What's new? Sure, the nationally ranked Cougars suffocated what was broadly understood to be one of the most dangerously weaponized offenses in the country. Jay Hill's side has been doing that all season.
A season that delivered nail-biter after nail-biter finally handed fans a comfortably cathartic victory over a Colorado side that entered with enough glamour and fanfare to make Chappell Roan blush. But these Midwest princesses saw their buffalo-drawn carriage had become a pumpkin by halftime.
Grit, game planning, drive, and unity defined this team all season. Ignoring the media, ignoring the onlookers, and ignoring all creeping thoughts of doubt, the Cougars delivered a masterclass of a football game as one final memento of what was, and will long be remembered as one of the greatest seasons in BYU football history.