PROVO – After a wild trip through the 2020 season and a whirlwind of three years in Provo, BYU quarterback Zach Wilson made his decision.
Corner Canyon High School’s 6-foot-3, 210-pound product is officially forwarded to the NFL.
Wilson made his decision on Friday and announced on social media, a long-awaited moment since the Cougars’ QB1 snatched the college football season in 2020.
In a long post on social media, Wilson thanked BYU’s head coach Kalani Sitake, sports director Tom Holmoe, offensive coordinator Jeff Grimes, defender coach Aaron Roderick and several other personal and personal coaches and tutors who helped go from Corner Canyon to a choice of the NFL draft projected in the first round.
He also thanked “the biggest fan base in the world” at BYU.
“Thanks for the best three years of my life,” wrote Wilson. “In our own home, or on the road, there was no doubt that the Blue Wave would be fierce. BYU is a special place. I always turn blue.
“To all my boys on the team and everyone else involved in my time here: Without you, I am nothing. You never forget those who went to battle with you; they are a part of you forever. Forever grateful to my line receivers. The strength team and training team for your infinite dedication to me. “
COUGAR NATION pic.twitter.com/pEa9RUMCTQ
– Zachary Wilson (@zachkapono) January 1, 2021
Junior is Utah’s sixth high school football product to be declared in advance for the 2021 draft, joining Stanford’s Simi Fehoko (Brighton), USC’s Jay Tufele (Bingham), Penei Sewell (Desert Hills) from Oregon, Dax Milne (BYU) from Bingham and his left face on BYU, Brady Christensen (Bountiful). The latter is probably the most important for Wilson, who will follow his trusted tackle as he has done throughout his BYU career – including the 2020 11-win season.
Wilson crowned his junior season with 3,692 yards and 33 touchdowns with just three interceptions, leading the Cougars to an 11-1 season with a performance that ends out of the top 10 in past yards in school history (Robbie Bosco ranks 10th with its 3,874 yards in 1984).
He fled the single season pass accuracy record, completing 74% of his passes to surpass Steve Young’s previous record of 71% set in 1983. (He also set a new career pass efficiency record for 162.91, a brand that has remained since Detmer posted a 162.74 during his career).
Wilson finished eighth nationally in the vote for the Heisman Trophy, a top 10 mark that is BYU’s best result since Ty Detmer’s runner-up season in 1991.
Detmer. Bosco. Young. Jim McMahon. John Beck. They all went through BYU’s quarterback mystique, and Wilson was mentioned at the same time as each of them on different occasions.
In three years at BYU, Wilson completed 68% of his passes for 7,652 yards and 56 touchdowns with just 15 interceptions. Nine of those choices came in 2019, when he struggled with several injuries in his second year, including his shoulder and thumb.
He also ran 642 yards and added 15 touchdowns on the ground. He lost only three fumbles in his entire career, all of them in 2019.
Wilson ended his career with a brilliant display at the Boca Raton Bowl, a 49-23 victory over UCF – a team that entered the game with one of the country’s biggest attacks, led by rising defender Dillon Gabriel.
But the Corner Canyon product surpassed its Hawaii counterpart, whose father Garrett Gabriel beat Detmer and the Cougars twice during the outstanding career of the former Heisman Trophy winner. Wilson completed 26 passes for 425 yards and three touchdowns, including a pair of scores for freshman Isaac Rex’s tight end and a miraculous throw for Neil Pau’u.
Wilson turned each of his receivers into lethal weapons, led by former walk-on Dax Milne, who took 70 passes for 1,188 yards and eight touchdowns to become BYU’s first 1,000-yard receiver since
The cougars compiled an explosive attack, ranking fourth in offensive scores (43.5 points per game), fourth in passing efficiency (189.35), seventh in total attack (522.2 yards per game) and eighth in passing attack (332.1 yards per game), through bowling games played on December 26.
COUGAR NATION pic.twitter.com/BLQtiKWygT
– Zachary Wilson (@zachkapono) January 1, 2021
A season that was previously in danger of being played out, with only two opponents on the agenda affected by the pandemic until August, turned into an 11-win tour de force – the best cougar drop since 2009 or 2001 or even 1996, depending on who you ask (or which metric you use).
But the numbers are not what Wilson will remember from his 2020 team. Like the shirts they wore during the warm-up, he will remember the “love” they felt for each other.
“The excitement we had in playing this game was special,” said Wilson. “Just looking around and absorbing everything was the coolest part. We will never have the same team again, with guys taking off next year, and things are always different.
“I love these guys, and that was the best part is that we left with all this excitement and energy, and they were excited to play.”
Wilson also had a brilliant career. He won his first freshman start in 2018 to help BYU through a 7-6 season, culminating in a perfect pass performance against Western Michigan at the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl.
A year later, Wilson struggled with multiple injuries – mostly in the shoulder and thumb – before taking BYU for another 7-6 season. But the son of former Utah defense player Mike Wilson left his best season for last, as he must declare for the 2021 NFL Draft in the coming days.
Facing a season in which all but two Cougars’ games were canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic, Wilson had a barnstorming binge against ESPN’s broadcast Group of Five. Instead of taking on Utah, Arizona, Michigan and Missouri, he presented gaudy numbers against a group that included Navy, Troy, Louisiana Tech and Houston, to name a few.
He encouraged BYU to his first victory at the Blue Turf in Boise, where he has already pledged to play, throwing 360 yards and three touchdowns in a 51-17 victory over then No. 21 Broncos and propelled his team to eighth position in the Top 25 of the Associated Press.
Instead of going back to a 2021 season that is scheduled to start September 2 against Arizona in Las Vegas – and features six opponents of the Power Five, including the return of former BYU coach Bronco Mendenhall to Provo with Virginia in October 30 – Wilson will use his talents for the NFL.
He is designed to be one of the top five defenders selected by most draft analysts, a leap behind the supposed No. 1 of Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence choice and mixed with a group that includes Ohio Fields from Ohio, Mac Jones from Alabama, Kyle Trask of Florida and North Trey Lance of the state of Dakota.
The Jacksonville Jaguars took first place in Sunday’s draft, with a submission by 1 to 14 and a game remaining in the 2020 season. Up to eight teams could select a defender in the first round, according to most projections, including the Jets (No. 2), Falcons (No. 3), Dolphins (No. 4), Lions (No. 8), Panthers (No. 9) and 49ers (No. 14).
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