Tuesday’s open practice session saw true freshman quarterback Bear Bachmeier take every team rep with the first team offense, indicating that he’s taken a lead role in the quarterback derby. The Stanford transfer responded well, looking composed and accurate in moving the offense while making some notable throws, including one to tight end Carsen Ryan in tight coverage for about a 25 yard gain.

According to BYU Offensive Coordinator Aaron Roderick, Bachmeier saw the majority of snaps with the first-teamers during Tuesday’s session with sophomore McCae Hillstead taking the remaining reps.

“We had a lot of success moving the ball when our first unit is in there,” Roderick said. “We got some good play out of our first-team. We’ve held back some of those first-team guys up to this point and now we’re starting to ramp up a bit and get those guys more involved. When our best eleven is on the field, we’re going to be tough to deal with.”

Roderick’s tone differed somewhat from the one he took following Saturday’s scrimmage, when he cited his offense as being “too sloppy.” It’s the type of response any offensive coordinator wants to see from his offense following a scrimmage where the defense clearly had the upper hand.

Roderick reemphasized the point that he can’t afford to maintain equal reps between the trio of Bachmeier, Hillstead and junior Treyson Bourguet, and Tuesday’s practice session proved that there has been a breaking point in the quarterback battle. Roderick stated that the plan now is to allocate first-team reps between Bachmeier and Hillstead, at least for the rest of the week, with Bourguet and freshman Emerson Geilman presumably seeing most of their work with the second and third-team units.

Roderick was impressed with what Bachmeier showed during Saturday’s scrimmage and into this week’s initial practice sessions.

“He throws a lot of completions,” Roderick said. “He doesn’t take sacks and he’s very accurate, and he’s throwing a lot of completions out here.”

Fall camp is set to wrap up in about a week with coaches necessarily focused on making a decision on who will start at quarterback some time before game preparation for BYU’s opener versus Portland State is set to begin.

“I feel an obligation to do the right thing for our program. For our players, first of all, and then the coaches and their families,” Roderick said. “First of all you want to get it right. And then for our fans, we’ve got great fans, and I want to make sure we put the guy on the field that’s earned it. It doesn’t matter if it’s a freshman, a sophomore or a transfer, the standard is the standard here at quarterback. We’re not going to lower that standard no matter what.”

FIGHTING TIME

Play can get chippy during any practice session, and according to BYU Coach Kalani Sitake, experience has taught him that the most chippy time is the present. The Cougars completed their twelfth practice session of fall camp on Tuesday with the plan to necessarily take a day off in an effort for players to recalibrate and perhaps avoid some extracurricular actively during practice sessions.

“We’re going to a team camp and do some team-bonding stuff. We did that last year, too,” Sitake said. “There’s a lot of really cool things that you can do to build the team…Everything has been about football until now when you can take a break from it. Most of the fights happen between practices 10-13, so let’s go camping during that time.”