C
craigoscarsonWe played
5 teams of the best 20 teams in the country.
Utah State (less than 7 points from being undefeated on the season)
SJSU is a top 20 team
Notre Dame has put together an incredible run (though I don't think they're a top 5 team and will be crushed by Bama)
Oregon State is top 20 but on their best day I think SJSU and Utah State beat them
Boise State also less than 7 points from being undefeated
7 of our opponents went to bowls, 4 of our opponents have won their bowl games, only Oregon State lost (and of course we beat SDSU) , and Notre Dame has a chance to win the national championship.
You could also make an argument that
SDSU put together a top 30 season
and
Georgia Tech certainly has top 20 talent but young and inconsistent (they're going to be scary good next season)
Ultimately, have we ever played so many good teams in a season? And I doubt we've ever led a team going to the national championship as late as the 4th quarter.
random thoughts:
Wth Ga Tech destroying USC, I think we learned that we ended up with an incredibly touch schedule this year and we simply fell a bit short from a sensational season (our qb and oline failed us from having one of the greatest teams in BYU history)
With Cody and KVN coming back , assuming we have a healthy spring and fall camp; I think we're a solid oline from having a Notre Dame like season.
my new years recruiting wishlist: I don't know how we couldn't get 1 elite juco punter, 1 elite juco dlineman and 1 elite juco corner to buy in, assuming they're still out there (at this point we might have to steal from other teams committed recruits).
I think we're getting upgrades at most positions
some upgrades simply by experience
Sorenson will be better
Bills is better than sampson
Johnson will be better
(I don't think we're going to replace Hadley successfully, Trammel has to be great)
Spencer Hadley will be great next year
KVN will be better and NFL ready (should win the Butkus)
Uani Unga is faster than Ogletree, but Tree is a winner
Manoa Pikula will effectively replace Kaveinga
Eathyn should go back to DT
Kaufusi can be just as effective as Ansah (Ziggy hasn't yet come near his ceiling though)
Peck can effectively replace Eathyn at the other DE
Remember this is assuming that Hill is the real deal and makes an effective recovery
Williams is going to grow and get stronger this summer, he's going to be scary; adrian peterson like
Cody will be as good if not better
Apo can't be worse... he's gotta get better
Falslev will improve (he kind of got lost in the last few weeks)
Iona Pritchard is going to finally make us forget Tonga
Mahina and Friel are going to be improved
Oline??????????? I'm clueless at this point, except that we have Ryker, Tushaus, and Reynolds that can start and should be improved from last year
We have a lot of beef on the oline but I really don't know who it's going to be
Then there are a lot of potential contributors that have in game experience
Hine
Lasike
Fua
Raymond
Holt
Wilson
Cutler
Houk
Ridley
Thompson
Beck
Bills
Jorgenson
and
Ragin III, Kalolo Manumaleuna Utu, Maataua Brown, and JonRyheem Peoples (assuming he go to the dline) could contribute immediately
Obviously Trenton Trammel has to pan out and must play for this team to be great
but in the end it comes down to the Oline, the success of Hill and obviously we can't make the same bone headed coaching decisions that cost us against Utah, Notre Dame, SJSU, and Boise State. We really were any 1 of these 3 from likely being a 1-2 loss team (1. qb 2. better oline play 3. better kicker) and we're not losing much from this team. I also don't think our schedule next season is really much harder than the one we played this year.
Our special teams should be solid but we're going to miss Riley Stephenson... course really good teams dont' need world class punters

