“It was crazy,” Bachmeier said after the game. “It was a surreal moment. It was just blue all around you and your heart starts beating a little. It was a great experience.”

Bachmeier’s meteoric rise from Stanford transfer to become the first true freshman to start a season-opener in Cougar history has been well-documented, but Saturday was the first chance for everyone to see how he would handle the high-profile position.

So how did he do?

Well, that kind of depends on what you focus on.

On the good side, he accounted for five touchdowns (three passing, two rushing), led BYU to 49 first-half points and wasn’t even needed for the final 30 minutes of the game in the 69-0 Cougar shutout.

But he was also only 7-of-11 passing for 95 yards with two or three passes that could’ve been picked off, had a slow start with two incompletions on three pass attempts on the first drive, and didn’t have to handle much pressure since BYU was so dominant.

Still, Cougar head coach Kalani Sitake said he was pleased overall with Bachmeier’s showing.

“I thought he did a great job,” Sitake said. “Once he started getting hit a little bit, then I think he was able to settle down. I think it’s hard when you get into this environment. It was a packed house and I think that could get you a little bit nervous. I think he was able to settle down.

“I think on some of the throws, he wished he can get those back. But overall, I thought he had a good demeanor about him. I thought he’d had a great presence. The guys felt really good about him leading the offense, and I felt good about how it finished in the first half.”

BYU tight end Carsen Ryan said Bachmeier didn’t show many nerves when the Cougar offense was on the field.

“I think he had a really good start coming in as a true freshman, playing his first game,” Ryan said. “We came out a little slower, you could tell he had a few butterflies, but that was everyone. We came out a little slow to start the game, but once we got rolling, he got confident in himself.

“He was playing a lot of really good football and making a lot of smart decisions. It was really good to see him making the right decision that we needed and throwing it to the right guys, then scrambling when he needed to and making plays with his feet too. There were a lot of good things from him that we saw in this game.”

When asked to assess his own performance, Bachmeier focused on what BYU accomplished overall.

“I thought it was a great team win,” he said. “I thought we ran the ball really well. We put up a lot of points and the defense was second to none.”

He acknowledged that it took a little bit to get comfortable in the game as he found a rhythm in the new setting.

“I think (I settled in) after that first series,” Bachmeier said. “We got a special teams touchdown and that kind of got the jitters out. You’ve got to kind of be mindful and present in the moment and just get comfortable with that.”

He said he wouldn’t have minded getting back on the field for the second half but since the Cougars were up 49-0 at the break, he understood why Sitake and the other BYU coaches elected to put other players on the field.

He also was quick to point out that although he got the credit for five touchdowns in the game, it was because of the entire offense.

“It’s a testament to the team first off, and the defense,” the Cougar freshman said. “The 10 guys around me make my job easier.”

He said that his objective for next week is to get things rolling from the start.

“I think that our first series could definitely be better,” Bachmeier said. “You want to get first downs, and (slow starts) happen in the first game, but I think we need to come out with our hats on fire and go score a touchdown in that first series.”