Rivalry burns hotter than ever, fueled by postgame rant

There are three ingredients that stoke a rivalry — a full house, a dramatic finish and a fiery post-game comment or two. BYU-Utah had all of that and more Saturday night at Rice-Eccles Stadium and as a result, the future of the annual dog fight received an emotional extension.
The 14 years of playing off and on and outside of the same conference took a toll on the rivalry. But as was evident in Saturday’s Big 12 reunion, in front of the largest crowd (54,383) in the history of Rice-Eccles Stadium, everything that had made this game incredible and infuriating before, returned in a tornado of emotion.
Emotional games often trigger emotional responses, which is why players have a cooling-off period before facing the live mics. This year, however, it wasn’t an athlete that produced banter, it was an adult in charge of them.
“This game was absolutely stolen from us,” said a defiant Utah athletic director Mark Harlan as he spewed his anger toward the officiating crew following BYU’s come-from-behind 22-21 victory. Then, to make sure he was heard correctly, he said it again. “We won this game. Someone else stole it from us.”
The someone else Harlan referred to was the official who flagged Utah’s Zemaiah Vaughn for defensive holding on what appeared to be the Cougars’ final offensive play of the game. As a result, BYU was rewarded with 10 yards and a first down — which is the cost of that infraction.
The Cougars proceeded to hit on plays of 30, 12 and 14 yards, slicing right through what had been a stubborn Utah defense. With time winding down, Will Ferrin ran onto the field and kicked a 44-yard field goal with four seconds remaining to win the game.
That’s a lot to put on a game official, whose holding call is supported by every camera angle (or phone) that was on in the stadium. Granted, there was a lot of pulling, pushing and holding by both teams throughout the game, including an errant face mask call against BYU that led to a Utah touchdown in the first half, but the timing of Vaughn’s penalty pushed Harlan to the brink.
However, to borrow from Harlan’s “stolen” declaration, shoplifting is still shoplifting, no matter if you are caught stealing at noon or five minutes before the store closes. In football, a penalty is a penalty no matter when it happens in the game.
Time will reveal what Saturday will mean for Utah’s top athletic administrator. He has already been reprimanded and fined by the Big 12. But one thing is for certain, just as there isn’t any video evidence to prove the call was a mistake, there is plenty of footage that will place Harlan’s postgame rant into the rivalry’s Hall of Shame for years to come.
Max Hall, Tyler Huntley, and others — step aside. There is a new instigator on the stage.
For most of the first half, the Utes were nearly flawless, and their followers were ecstatic. Even with a quarterback making his first start, they looked like the team that was expected to win the Big 12 and they were overwhelming the squad currently unbeaten and sitting alone in first place.
After some halftime adjustments, BYU (9-0, 5-0) flipped the script and outscored Utah 12-0 to win the game in Salt Lake City for the first time since 2006.
Understandably, Harlan’s reaction was triggered by the holding call and officiating in general, it could have easily reflected Utah’s season. As Ferrin’s field goal sailed through the uprights, the Utes were handed their fifth-straight defeat (4-5, 1-5) and slipped into 15th place in the Big 12 — that’s enough to make anyone mad.
In a rivalry where boys can elevate to play like men, including Utah’s defensive line and BYU’s kicker, it also can turn men into boys and sometimes they act like one. Head coach Kyle Whittingham slammed a chair to the ground as he was leaving the podium following his news conference. He too was upset, but he didn’t go so far as to declare “the game was stolen.”
For two schools who launched a campaign to encourage fans to “Rival Right” they watched a tremendous, improbable battle right up to the final second — and then they watched an administrator take a hard left and add the kind of fuel to an already-heated rivalry that could only come from the words — “The game was absolutely stolen from us.”
It’s a shame Utah used all their timeouts during the game, because Harlan could have really used one before sitting down at the microphone and adding more fuel to a fire that already burns deep — and will continue next November in Provo.
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.