BYU football: Seniors helped Cougars regroup after blowout conference loss

PROVO — BYU's seniors were understandably frustrated after the Cougars were blown out by No. 4 TCU a couple of weeks ago. And during the ensuing bye week, they helped ensure that BYU got back to the business of winning.

That's what happened last Saturday in Laramie in the form of a 52-0 rout of Wyoming.

"The seniors really took leadership of this team and forced everyone to step up their games," said sophomore running back J.J. DiLuigi, who scored two touchdowns against the Cowboys.

With the win, BYU improved to 7-2 overall and moved up three spots to No. 22 in the Associated Press poll released Sunday.

"There is a lot of leadership on this team," said senior safety Scott Johnson. "It's hard to lose big to TCU. We weren't discouraged by that. We had to regroup. We still have fun playing the game."

The way BYU bounced back last weekend was much different from what happened after the Cougars' 32-7 defeat at TCU in 2008. In the aftermath of that setback a year ago, BYU struggled to get past UNLV and Colorado State, winning those games by a combined 10 points.

"Obviously, that was kind of a hard loss for us," senior quarterback Max Hall said of the 38-7 defeat at home to the Horned Frogs on Oct. 24. "Unlike the year before, I don't think we really lost our swagger and lost our confidence in playing the game and our excitement to play with each other. That's what I love about this group of guys, especially the seniors. We're really close and we know we're playing for each other and that every game counts."

That includes this week's contest at winless New Mexico (0-9, 0-5), which fell at Utah last Saturday, 45-14.

Senior defensive lineman Jan Jorgensen is looking for BYU to continue to build momentum. "We did a really good job (against Wyoming)," he said. "Hopefully it carries on to next week and the week after."

Jorgensen added that "it won't be tough at all" to get up emotionally for the beleaguered Lobos.

"Our coaches do a great job of preparing us the same no matter who we play," he said. "It's interesting the way that we practice just as hard for a team like New Mexico, or like we did for Tulane, as we did for our Oklahoma game or our TCU game. We practice just as hard and we work just as hard. So I don't think it will be any different this week."

"Our goal is to improve our team with the time we have remaining. I think we improved (last Saturday)," said coach Bronco Mendenhall. "I'd like us to improve again next week, and then again and then again. That's the commitment I've made to our seniors and to this team. Time is short. I think the urgency to prepare is not relation to our opponents (but) how good we can get..."