The view from Brigham Young football’s LaVell Edwards Stadium is quite impressive, and the Cougars’ home field seats 63,470. BYU’s massive Marriott Center seats 19,000, down from 22,700 when it was built in 1971.
But the most stunning athletic venue on the Provo, Utah, campus is Miller Park, a baseball/softball dual complex, with the stadiums stationed back-to-back and sharing a huge concourse and a sizable pressbox, while having mirror facilities for both sports in the guts of the facility.
And no. It’s not named after the beer company. Miller Park is named after Larry and Gail Miller, who owned the Utah Jazz for many years.
On our second night in Provo, Trish the Dish and I went to the BYU-Santa Clara baseball game. Except we ended up going to the BYU-Loyola Marymount softball game, and it took only a few steps.
The baseball game started at 7 pm, but a softball doubleheader had begun at 5 pm We arrived about 7:15 on a gorgeous, 70-degree night, and the softball action was between games. So we decided to watch some baseball.
But we couldn’t find a place to sit in the 2,204-seat Larry H. Miller Field. Even some temporary bleachers were packed. It seems like all of Provo had the same idea – take advantage of the perfect weather.
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So we meandered over to the softball game – took us about 20 seconds – which was just starting. There were plenty of seats at softball’s 2,100-seat Gail Miller Field. I don’t know why the preference for baseball over softball. The latter is much more successful at BYU.
Anyway, the views at both fields are spectacular. Baseball has the better setting—it was built first; the softball connector was added later – with the Wasatch Mountains, rising regally above evergreen trees, in the near distance beyond the outfield walls. The Marriott Center sits between the walls and the mountains.
The softball view has mountains, too, but its view also includes LaVell Edwards Stadium, the city of Provo and, in the far distance, Utah Lake.
BYU is headed for the Big 12, which is why I’m here for a couple of days, preparing a package that will introduce the Cougars to Oklahomans.
BYU will need to do some things to get up to Big 12 speed. Including some facility upgrades. But in some ways, BYU facilities are ahead of the Big 12 standard.
BYU’s diamond sports have better facilities than OSU or OU softball, plus OU baseball. Not better than OSU baseball, of course, with Stillwater’s O’Brate Stadium a $30 million jewel. But think about it; A school in northern Utah has excellent softball and baseball facilities.
That kind of commitment is why BYU is Big 12 ready.
My second day in Provo was fun. Tours of Lavell Edwards Stadium, the Marriott Center and BYUTV’s three-story headquarters. Lunch with associate athletic director for communications Jon McBride. An interview with BYU athletics’ chief fundraiser Chad Lewis, a long-time Cougars hero who played nine years as a Philadelphia Eagles tight end. Meeting another Oklahoma connection, compliance director Chad Gwilliam, a high school teammate of Justin Fuente at Tulsa Union. Meeting deputy AD Brian Santiago, who was on the basketball staff when Daniel Bobik was a Cougar, before Bobik transferred to OSU and started on Eddie Sutton’s 2004 Final Four team.
It was a great time and incredibly educational. I won’t spoil the ending if I tell you this. There are many things about the new look Big 12 to wonder about. BYU’s readiness is not one of them. Mike Gundy had it right when he said BYU is a Power 5 school in search of a Power 5 Conference.
The thing that most impresses me about the BYU personnel is the willingness to discuss the unique history of the university, the athletic department and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. They own up to their shortcomings throughout history and they don’t apologize for their commitment to Christ.
A catchphrase you hear a lot from Christians is something like, “I’m a person of faith.” You don’t hear that much from the Mormons. They say, “I follow Christ.” There’s not any hedging.
That message is what inspired BYUTV, which is broadcast worldwide and is appointment television for LDS members. BYUTV produces a daily, one-hour SportsNation show. BYU asked me to be a guest on the Friday show, which I was glad to do. We chatted for probably 12-15 minutes. That night at the softball game, a BYU fan stopped me on the concourse, told me he enjoyed the segment earlier that day and thanked me for coming to Provo.
BYUTV is a thriving enterprise, with 160 full-time employees plus an army of student workers, that shames The Longhorn Network. ESPN can’t wait to get out from under Bevo TV; that’s probably why the Sooners and Longhorns are headed to the Southeastern Conference. Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby certainly believes in an ESPN conspiracy.
The LDS church has much more stamina for BYUTV than ESPN has for The Longhorn Network. How will BYUTV be involved with the Big 12? Too early to tell. But BYUTV has been producing its own telecasts of sporting events for more than a decade and produces a variety of West Coast Conference events. No reason why BYUTV can’t enhance the Big 12.
McBride and I had a great visit over lunch at Black Sheep Cafe downtown. It’s billed as Native American food, which took me back. I live in Oklahoma; I ought to know what Native American food is. Outside of Indian tacos, I’m not sure I could describe Native cuisine.
Turns out, Black Sheep does indeed promote its Indian tacos – calls them Navajo tacos – and I had a green chile version. Very good. Jon had hog jowl tacos, which threw me. My only connection to hog jowls is from the Beverly Hillbillies. Granny apparently could cook up a mean mess of hog jowls.
Back to the facilities. The football stadium, while fine, probably needs the most upgrades. Lavell Edwards Stadium – named for BYU’s legendary coach, 1972-2000 – ranks on the level of Iowa State’s Jack Trice Stadium and West Virginia’s Milan Puskar Stadium, ahead of Kansas, but behind the other seven schools. Iowa State and West Virginia have their football headquarters adjacent to the field. BYU’s football complex is a couple of blocks away from LaVell Edwards Stadium.
LaVell Edwards has most of the amenities you need, including a giant new video board. But there are infrastructure improvements that could be made, though nothing outlandish. More luxury suites would help; BYU has about 42. Doubling that would help the Cougars immensely, and there’s room for such expansion.
But the view, hard against the Wasatch Mountains, is glorious, and the stands are almost always close to full. Once OU and Texas are gone, BYU will lead the Big 12 in attendance year after year.
We left the ballgames early to grab a late dinner and found a great little Italian joint, La Dolce Vita. It opened in 1984, and its current chefs are the extended family of the original founders, Gianni and Susi Della Corte. Trish the Dish had a calzone that’s unlike what we see in the Southwest, this one served bathing in marinara sauce. I had orange roughy, served with fettucine alfredo, so I turned it into a great seafood pasta. Really good.
The Dish had spent part of the day touring the BYU Museum of Art, so we were quite immersed in a variety of offerings from the university.
Which is why we’re here.
Berry Tramel: Berry can be reached at 405-760-8080 or at [email protected]. He can be heard Monday through Friday from 4:40-5:20 pm on The Sports Animal radio network, including FM-98.1. Support his work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today.
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