Solid start: As always, energy and enthusiasm highlight first day of BYU football fall camp

BYU defensive coordinator Jay Hill grinned Tuesday afternoon when asked how he feels about getting back to focusing on football.
“This is the best time of year,” Hill said. “It’s like Christmas every day for us. We actually get to be football coaches and do the stuff that we love. We love coming out on the grass. We love getting our guys together. We like the camaraderie of what you’re trying to create as a football team.”
That energy and enthusiasm what you expect on the opening day of fall camp, whether in Provo or at any other college football program across the country.
“The thing that’s obvious to me right now we got a bunch of guys that care,” Hill said. “They want to do things right. They go hard. That’s a great place to start. I think that that’s where most different great defenses are built. I thought the organization in detail of just everything that went on today was very good.”
Cougar head coach Kalani Sitake had a similar assessment of what he saw from the BYU team as a whole on Day 1 of practice.
“I liked it,” Sitake said. “I saw a lot of talent, a lot of depth and good competition. We got a lot of reps out there so we’ll have a lot of film to watch. Overall there was a lot of energy and Day 1 is supposed to be like that. But there is a different feeling to the team this year because of the great leadership and coaching they are getting.”
Cougar senior quarterback Kedon Slovis has passed this marker at a few different places in recent seasons and he feels like the 2023 BYU squad was well-prepared to get rolling in camp.
“I think the good thing here is we’ve done so many PRPs (player-run practices) before today,” Slovis said. “Rhere shouldn’t be any missed assignments. We’ve done all these plays probably four or five times now in PRPs alone. I don’t think we made any mental errors and everyone for the most part did their job. We executed some things better, but that’s the stuff I look for today.”
Overall, he said he was also satisfied with what he saw on the field.
“Obviously there are a lot of new guys, new face,” Slovis said. “It’s the first day camp so it’s not going to be perfect. There’s always a few plays you want to have back but it’s good knock the rust off. I think we executed pretty well.”
On the defensive side of the ball, Cougar sophomore defensive back Micah Harper said he loved being out there with his guys.
“It felt really good to be back,” Harper said. “It was good to have some of the guys who missed spring ball out there, as well as the new additions from the transfer portal. It was a great practice. Offense, defense, special teams, we all got after it. It’s always good when we are back to football.”
While every team wants a good beginning to camp, what really matters is what is accomplished over the next month before the season starts.
“I just think that we need to know our defense, know how we play and build our chemistry,” Harper said. “At the end of the day, if we play our best ball, obviously it’d be hard for offenses to score on us.”
Slovis said he wants to see consistency.
“We need to continue to develop and be the same team every day,” Slovis said. “There’s a lot of new faces. I know up front some things are going to move around. At wideout, things are going to move around. Guys are going to be plugged in to play different spots, even at running back. So guys have got to be comfortable. Guys have got to step up. We can’t waste opportunities out here. We all need to show up every day and be consistent.”
Sitake said his main focus is to keep the competition going and solidify the depth chart a little bit.
“Right now, there are a lot of great athletes who are competing for limited spots,” Sitake said. “I think in the next little bit we’ll just get him as many reps as we can and then evaluate and see what we’ve got to go with. As we get close to the game, we’ll solidify the starting spots and the roles and different things that we’re going to do with our sub packages.”