Do you remember Jimmer's senior season at BYU? Of course you do. That's the same year that he won the Naismith National Player of the Year award over future NBA All-Star Kemba Walker, pushed BYU hoops as high as third in the AP top 25, and reached the Sweet 16 in that year's tournament. That season was legendary for more reasons than we could count.
But I'll always remember that as the year that a player's absence kept the Cougars out of the Final Four, and potentially the national championship game. Brandon Davies, a phenomenal freshman center, was suspended at the tail end of the regular season for an honor code violation, tearing the starting 5-man from the lineup and lowering that team's ceiling.
It was without Davies that BYU lost to 2-seed Florida in overtime, and that narrow defeat kept the Cougars out of the elite eight and a wide-open path to the national title game. Next in line were meetings against 8-seed Butler and 11-seed VCU before a final matchup with 3-seed UConn in the final. There is no guarantee that Jimmer and friends would have gone the distance with Davies, but losing in overtime is a tough pill to swallow when the remaining road was about as simple as possible.
This year's BYU basketball team entered the year with aspirations of a Final Four berth, stuffed with talent end to end, but against the truly great teams in the Big 12 Conference, BYU has fallen flat. Shallow on the depth chart with three primary offensive producers and a cast of others, a sense that this team was poorly constructed overall is beginning to creep into the atmosphere, poisoning discourse and suggesting that the once-dubbed "greatest basketball team in BYU history" may not have the fuel to carry them over the hill.
Much like with the 2011 Cougars, I point the finger of blame at unavailability. Injuries have been the silent killer for BYU hoops this season. Taking a look at the injury report for any given game makes BYU look like the Utah Jazz, a team deliberately trying to lose games. The list of names stacks skyward for absent Cougars, and much of the damage cannot be undone.
Right before the season-opener, transfer guard Nate Pickens injured his knee and was declared out for the season. Since most BYU fans have never seen Pickens take the floor, it's difficult to envision this team with him available. But as a 40% 3-point shooter and defensive ace, Pickens is exactly the type of player that could effortlessly take the pressure off the "Big 3" of Wright, Saunders, and Dybantsa -- on both ends of the floor.
But we all saw Dawson Baker go down with a knee injury against Miami, and his absence has been impossible to ignore. His ability to self-create and put pressure on the defense would work wonders for the team's current stop-and-go offense. Shot-making, ball-handling, and basketball IQ are desperately low outside the Cougars' core, and Baker was meant to be the savvy veteran guard who could take the top off the defense when necessary.
Not to mention silent injuries to four-star freshman center Xavion Staton, and redshirting Brody Kozlowski.
This team still has talent at the top of the roster capable of competing with anybody in the nation. But with less help than anticipated at the dawn of the season, we may be left looking back at the 2025-26 season wondering what could have been.