PROVO, Utah – The BYU football team finished off another practice session on the third week of fall camp Thursday afternoon.
A mostly player-run practice, the afternoon featured a lot of 11-on-11 work with the receiving group getting a lot of work.
The Cougars are bringing back a talented group of wideouts in 2019, including leading returners Micah Simon, Talon Shumway and Aleva Hifo, all seniors for the upcoming year. In addition to those leaders, BYU also returns Gunner Romney and Dax Milne, fresh off of promising starts to their young careers after contributing in 2018.
The receiver room also includes Brayden Cosper, Koy Harris, Spencer Romney and Austin Whetzel who spent time with the group last season. Newcomers include speedster Luc Andrada, Talmage Gunther, Tevita Ika and Keanu Hill.
The following quotes are from Thursday's post-practice media availability.
Head coach Kalani Sitake
It was a good practice. We’ll have some time off for the guys to recover physically but we’ll still work on some things. I thought it was a really good practice today. We did some things a little different. It was basically our player day. We allowed them to run basically our whole day. It was a good opportunity for coaches to get some feedback on how they teach each other and how they work so today we took a step back and allowed the players to run the show.
From meetings to practice tempo to what drills they wanted to run, everything was done by them today and I was really impressed with them so we had a really good day of practice and I think they had a lot of ownership in it and I think it’s going to be a huge step for us and our program going into the next phase which is getting ready for the Utah game.
On why it’s important for the players to take ownership in that way
I think that the best way to learn is intrinsic, so if these guys can take the initiative to teach each other and to learn it themselves, that goes a long way. I don’t really believe in pedestal teaching, it’s probably one of the least effective ways of teaching is for one person to lecture, especially if it’s me probably. So we’re trying to find ways for these guys to learn and embrace the concept of learning and it’s something we thought would be really important.
We talk about having a player’s program and having the team belong to the players and what better way to show it than to give them some autonomy and some ownership and I thought they did an amazing job. I have to commend the coaches for what they did and the preparation they’ve done with these young men and so I just saw a lot of great leadership and good mentoring from player to player. It was a cool thing for the coaches to take a step back and then take a look at it and evaluate themselves to see what else they can do in their teaching to help modify things in the next little bit so that we can take advantage of as much learning as possible.
On which positions are the most undecided right now
All of them. They’re all up in the air. I still think that the twos are only one play away from getting in. So we have to get them all ready. The competition has been going good. I think the middle linebacker competition is looking really nice. And the depth chart at corner is looking good for us too. I’m really impressed with the young guys that have stepped up and the newcomers that have come to the program. I think that gives us a bright future.
Offensive lineman James Empey
On the player-run practice
It was fun. We got to learn a little bit about what goes into a practice and there’s a lot more than you think. The planning part was kind of cool, just learning and getting things down and structuring it the way you want to do it. It was just a cool experience because everyone was coaching. With the o-linemen everyone was talking, everyone was kind of putting in their two cents and coaching a little bit. There were a lot of people who were contributing to the practice so it was kind of cool to see everyone come together and work. It was just a cool experience, I thought we did alright.
Everybody on the o-line kind of stepped up, even some of the younger guys. We made sure everybody had a chance to talk and get a feel. Our group is pretty comfortable with each other so everybody was open to coaching around and talking and working through things.
On the benefits of having player-run practices
When Coach brought it up he was like, ‘The only thing different from this practice to the next is the coaches aren’t going to be as involved but you guys need to be just as involved because it’s your team just as much as it is mine or anybody else’s. So hopefully we can keep being our best selves and working at being better leaders and better teammates and team members and just doing our part to keep the team solid.
On where the O-line is sitting compared to past years
I feel like we’re sitting pretty good, we’re only a couple weeks into camp but we’ve learned a lot and have come a long way since then. I feel like we’re just making strides every day to be our best selves. So are we there yet? I don’t think so but guys are working really hard, guys have been working really hard in the offseason and are trying their best to be their best. So I feel like we’re on the right path for sure.
On what they need to work on to feel ready for the season
Probably a little bit of everything. There are a lot of different aspects to the o-line, and we’ve got to get better at all of them. So whether it’s individual technique things or scheme things, we need to get better at it if we want to be our best and play our best when the Saturday’s roll around.