With Cougar coaches offering little to no distinction between which of the three quarterbacks battling for the starting nod have gained any sort of upper-hand through two weeks of practices, Saturday’s live event could prove a breaking point.

So far every open practice session has shown ebbs and flows between sophomore McCae Hillstead, junior Treyson Bourguet and freshman Bear Bachmeier with regards to order of reps taken and how effective each has performed, but nothing consistent or substantial. While open practice sessions have been severely limited, coaches haven’t exactly been forthcoming in providing any clues of whom they’re leaning toward starting at this juncture either.

Of course the reason there hasn’t been any indication provided is perhaps because neither of the three have truly separated themselves through practice competition rather than coaches opting to remain coy. But that’s about to change, perhaps, with the season inching closer and the trio of battling quarterbacks set to undergo their biggest test of live reps to date while facing unleashed defensive pressure.

“The pass rush changes when everything goes live,” said BYU Coach Kalani Sitake following Wednesday’s team photo day. “…I want to put some pressure on them and see how they respond to all that. So that’s that’s what we’re going to do on Saturday. I think getting ready and prepping the next two days with today and the next practice. On Thursday and Friday just basically just to get ready.”

Yes, Saturday’s scrimmage will be live, with players going at it full-contact other than the quarterbacks, who will still be adorned with green practice jerseys, which means the defense cannot hit them.

“I don’t think the first time that they tackle, or get tackled, in a game is good for us,” Sitake said as to his reasoning to go live. “That’s just my personal view. Jay Hill and Aaron Roderick, they feel the same way. Those guys will get opportunities to make tackles and get tackled, even if they have started here. … I don’t want the first time for them to go live to be against Portland State. That is not going to be good for us.”

Sitake expects Saturday’s scrimmage to feature a lot of contact, or at least that’s the hope.

“It’s probably going to be probably the most physical one we’ll have with the scrimmage,” he said. “I imagine ones and twos getting a lot of live reps and then also the threes…so working on getting used to the clock, all that stuff that you do in a game situation. We’ll have coaches up in the box, all that stuff. I imagine it’s gonna be a lot of reps.”

Of course quarterback isn’t the only position that needs to be sorted out. The competition is still fierce at most positions, particularly at positions such as cornerback, safety and defensive end.

At cornerback recent practice sessions have seen senior Mory Bamba and junior Evan Johnson taking most of the reps with the first team, although stiff competition could be on tap from players such as JUCO transfer Jayden Dunlap, sophomore Terrian Alexander and sophomore Jonathan Kabeya, among others.

At safety it’s well-assumed that senior Tanner Wall will start, but it remains an open competition as to who will see the most reps alongside him. The safeties who have logged the most first-team reps during open sessions are sophomore Tommy Prassas, junior Raider Damuni, senior Talan Alfrey and sophomore Faletau Satuala.

At defensive end it remains completely wide open, although it’s pretty much a lock that senior Logan Lutui will be listed on top of the depth chart come BYU’s first game of the season versus Portland State.

“I want to see them tackle well, block well and just do the little things right,” Sitake summed up regarding the goal of Saturday’s scrimmage. “It’s going to be weird because you want the offense to take care of the football, but you want the defense to get after it and take the ball away. So we’ll see how that goes…defensively, I can’t ask them to slow down, so the offense is going to have to catch up to them. The defense has set the standard, but the offense is getting there.”