Church leader: BYU sports can’t drift from core principles

No one knows what the future of college sports is going to look like. It was but a few years ago when the transfer portal didn’t exist and paying players was the NCAA’s harshest infraction. Things have changed quickly. The portal has players on the move and NCAA/NIL rulings have student-athletes cashing in.

For church-sponsored BYU, the decision to remain in the game is not always an easy call to make.

“I hear two different voices. Neither is right, but I hear them a lot. On the one hand, it’s ‘We have to be like Texas or Alabama — more money, more facilities, higher pay and chasing after that,” Elder Clark Gilbert, Church Education Commissioner for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, told the “Y’s Guys” podcast this week.

“On the other hand, I have people who love the BYU Cougars but say, ‘Elder Gilbert, we are the Church of Jesus Christ on the earth. We care about repentance and the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are helping poor people around the world. How can we be spending this much on a game?”

Sports at BYU is a big business. It costs a lot. It also creates significant and much needed self-funding and exposure to justify the investment — so long as it’s done the right way.

“There are a lot of things that aren’t in our control and things going through the House settlement and NCAA negotiations. We’ll have to work within that,” said Elder Gilbert. “But if it ever came down to the only way to stay in this is to walk away from our values, that would be the end of athletics at BYU. This is not going to happen because we are committed to it from the Board (of Trustees), to the commissioner, to the president, to the athletics director, to the coaches. We have a culture here that is exceptional and I’m confident it won’t happen. There is no other place like this.”

Elder Gilbert cited the built-in church structure that is designed to keep BYU, athletics or academics, from drifting. The buck stops at the Board of Trustees, which includes the First Presidency.

“All binding decisions go through (BYU) President Shane Reese to me and then to the full board,” Elder Gilbert said. “No one else can bind the university in any other way, not Tom Holmoe (athletic director), not the donors, and not our coach.”

The commissioner reiterated that no direct tithing is used to support BYU athletics.

“This is a good thing and a bad thing. The good thing is we use tithing for the core work of the church,” Elder Gilbert said. “The bad thing is this could make someone say, ‘Great, we can just do whatever we want.’ But the governance remains universally tied to the Church Board of Education.”

When it comes to paying coaches, like football coach Kalani Sitake or the new men’s basketball coach Kevin Young, there is no “outside” money.

“Coaches’ salaries are internally funded. They are not funded by donors despite all the rumors and all the speculation,” Elder Gilbert said. “They are funded by athletics and from athletic revenue and are completely under the control of the university.”

“We have no debt funding. I look at Washington State with a quarter-billion dollars in debt, and then their conference changed. How are they ever going to pay that out?” Elder Gilbert said. “We don’t do that at BYU. We don’t do that in BYU athletics.

“We remain anchored in the Honor Code, ecclesiastical endorsement and our dress and grooming standards,” Elder Gilbert said. “We also retain the ability to act independently, including who we recruit and who we admit to the school. All of these things protect us from drifting. One of the biggest ways (to do it) is hiring the right people.”

Young turned down high-dollar NBA opportunities to take the job at BYU and fans have watched him and his staff quickly build a roster of high-profile athletes, including NBA prospects Egor Demin and Kanon Catchings. When it comes to managing NIL, the church leaves that up to BYU.

“The church isn’t going to weigh in on dollar amounts or recruits, that’s the job of the university,” said Elder Gilbert. “But we will lay out some principles. We can never become a place where the culture is pay to play. We would undermine everything at BYU if that wins out. It’s tempting (but) if they don’t fit the mission, we’d unravel everything.”

BYU football’s 7-0 start and No. 11 national ranking has attracted millions of television viewers on Fox, ESPN and BYUtv. The Cougars play at UCF on Saturday (1:30 p.m., ESPN). The Big 12 pays BYU millions in media rights fees and offers unprecedented exposure.

Prior to the Arizona game (Oct. 12), CBS, ESPN and Fox aired stories about a thriving Jake Retzlaff being the only Jewish quarterback in college football — and playing at BYU. In terms of the church and the environment on campus, the message Retzlaff delivered was priceless.

“It’s not just that he’s Jewish and not just that he is at BYU,” said Elder Gilbert. “Authentically, his experience around faith here has been transformational.”

Elder Gilbert said BYU isn’t just looking for television time for its teams, but an opportunity to deliver a product that reflects the values of the church.

“(There are) millions of viewers when you have a Saturday audience. We would call that in this business ‘earned media.’ You aren’t buying an ad, you are drawing attention because of what you are doing,” said Elder Gilbert. “It’s really wonderful, but again, if it doesn’t reflect our values, it doesn’t matter.”

Dave McCann is a sportswriter and columnist for the Deseret News and is a play-by-play announcer and show host for BYUtv/ESPN+. He co-hosts “Y’s Guys” at ysguys.com and is the author of the children’s book “C is for Cougar,” available at deseretbook.com.