BYU football: Cougars are experienced in rebounding

PROVO — In answering the question about where the BYU football program goes from here after a crushing 54-28 defeat to Florida State Saturday at LaVell Edwards Stadium, the Cougars have points of reference to draw upon.

A year ago, TCU obliterated BYU's perfect season with a 32-7 rout in mid-October. The Cougars were really never the same again, limping along before falling in the regular-season finale to Utah and then to Arizona in the Las Vegas Bowl.

On the other hand, in both 2006 and 2007, BYU lost early nonconference games — starting 1-2 both seasons — before producing 10 straight wins and claiming outright Mountain West Conference championships.

Which path will the 2-1 Cougars, who dropped 12 spots in The Associated Press poll to No. 19, take this season? Will this embarrassing setback to the Seminoles, who jumped to No. 18 in the rankings, shake the Cougars' confidence or steel their resolve?

The answer should come fairly soon. BYU hosts Colorado State (3-0) Saturday in its conference-opener.

So with BCS dreams likely dashed, with the glare of the national spotlight gone, the Cougars are back to reality. Now it's all about contending for a MWC championship, which will be a challenge that's tough enough.

"I think this team is still focused, still motivated," said quarterback Max Hall. "In the locker room last year a loss like this would have felt like almost the world came to an end. But I think the guys are excited to learn from it, to get better and to move on. It almost feels a little bit like '07 where we lost early, but we still had a chance to go and win the conference. So that's our No. 1 goal right now. The attitude and everything is still right so we just have to respond and I think we will."

"We definitely have a better attitude this year. From the coaches down to the players, there's a much better attitude," said defensive lineman Jan Jorgensen. "I expect us to bounce back much better than we did last year. You never know until we're back here out on the field against Colorado State next week, but I would expect us to bounce back much, much better than last year."

"There's a ton of things we can learn from this," Hall said of the FSU loss. "The good thing for us, it's a non-conference game. We had a great opportunity to win this game and keep things rolling. Now we have to focus on the conference. Conference is tough this year. Colorado State is really going to try to play us hard and they're very well-coached this year. We've still got a long road ahead of us. We've got to learn from it and move on."