What went wrong with BYU’s offense last year, and how can the Cougars fix it?

The BYU football team runs through drills during the first day of spring camp Feb. 29, 2024, in Provo. | Aaron Cornia/BYU

It has been a long and trying football offseason for BYU offensive coordinator Aaron Roderick, the man most responsible for getting the Cougars’ attack rolling again after BYU’s offense plummeted to the bottom fourth of most NCAA statistical categories in 2023.

BYU’s defense, though riddled by injuries, generally improved under the direction of new defensive coordinator Jay Hill — aside from some miserable performances against West Virginia and Iowa State — but the offense definitely took a step backwards from Roderick’s first few years at the helm, and the result was a 5-7 overall record, 2-7 in the Big 12. Two veteran offensive coaches were let go: tight ends coach Steve Clark and offensive line coach Darrell Funk.

“Obviously I was super disappointed in how we played,” Roderick told the Deseret News last month before spring practices began. “We had great continuity on offense in the prior few years at receiver, tight end, quarterback, offensive line. And then a year ago I really underestimated how long it would take for us to play as a unit when we had so many new players.”

New faces included quarterbacks Kedon Slovis and Jake Retzlaff, running backs Aidan Robbins, Deion Smith and LJ Martin, and receivers Darius Lassiter and Keelan Marion and offensive linemen Paul Maile, Weylin Lapuaho and Caleb Etienne. Slovis’ injury in the 35-6 loss to Texas in Game 8 proved to be season-ending, and obviously contributed to the offense’s late-season struggles. But even before then it was sputtering and not up to Roderick’s standards.

“It took us too long to gel and play as a unit, and execute as a unit,” Roderick said. “It started to come together in the last couple games of the…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/went-wrong-byu-offense-last-040000875.html

Author : Deseret News

Publish date : 2024-03-06 04:00:00

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