Nobody knows how Jake Retzlaff’s case will turn out. Not yet.
It will take the courts months, maybe years, to sift through the facts in the recently filed civil lawsuit brought against the BYU quarterback, who the suit alleges sexually assaulted a woman in November 2023.
Retzlaff’s lawyer has said his client is “factually innocent” and that they will “establish Jake’s innocence through the judicial system.” He said nothing about the possibility of an investigation under BYU’s honor code, the behavioral canon that applies to all students and prohibits, among other things, sex outside of marriage. Perhaps other evidence eventually will emerge.
Where does that leave BYU football?
I suspect it leaves the school perplexed. It leaves it asking questions. It leaves it in a hurry — with a season starting in 95 days.
And in a greater sense, considering BYU’s drive for competitive success, it must leave leaders wondering how often future collisions will occur between problems among star athletes and the school’s principles. As BYU continues to sign high-profile athletes, drawing them in with enticements such as NIL money, it will be most interesting to see how complications involving the honor code are handled.
It could leave it asking: Is it worth the risks?
The allegation against Retzlaff has ramifications and consequences for a religious school that loves its football, that wants to win at football, but does not want an accused student athlete lining up under center as its quarterback.
Anyone who knows anything about the modern game knows that the quarterback position is not just the most important position in football, but in all of team sports. And it’s not just the position, it’s the person, the personality, filling it that is central to team success.
At BYU, it’s a whole lot more than just that. It’s the face of the team. It’s the face of the school. In some corners, it’s the face of a church. The quarterback isn’t required to be a card-carrying member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, BYU’s owner. He can be Jewish, as Retzlaff is. He can be Catholic. He can be Presbyterian or Protestant or Baptist or Buddhist or none of the above. What he can’t be, at least not all out in the open, is a breaker of the law or a serious breaker of the honor code.
What, then, was formerly a certainty, that Retzlaff would lead the charge in BYU’s follow-up to its 11-2 season, is now thrown into a blender of uncertainty. The junior who had guided the Cougars through so much winning in 2024 was now to be a senior, carrying all the responsibility of stewardship that goes with his position. Not just delivering the ball where it needs to go, but taking and having command of the huddle, having the respect of his teammates and coaches. He need not be a milkshake-slurping Seminary president, but he’d better be a leader of men, which would include being a respecter of women.
Knowing BYU administrators like we do, and by extension leadership of the school’s owner, it’s a good bet that those leaders will not casually sit back and allow an athlete facing serious allegations to go on assuming the BYU quarterback spot, as though nothing has happened. Positive public relations often are a top-drawer priority.
They want national recognition, not nightmares.
I do not know with exactness how school and ecclesiastical leaders will discover what they consider the truth in the case, but I believe they will not simply ignore the allegation, waiting for the courts to rule, all with Retzlaff taking the field, same as it ever was.
BYU will make a decision of its own in more prompt executive fashion, that’s the guess here, completing its own fact-finding mission to land on a determination. Its determination. If that determination goes against the quarterback, we’ll see how the school loosens entanglements that could come along with other legalities and issues such as NIL money. This could be a big deal and yet become a bigger one.
In the meantime, in Retzlaff’s case, a hundred other BYU football players and coaches are left to do what everyone else — fans and foes alike — must do: wait, at least for a minute.
One thing is rock-solid certain: In a fresh effort by BYU to draw in top athletes, Latter-day Saint or otherwise, as a means of building top competitive teams, emphasizing its sports in order to represent the church and gain positive recognition for the school, for the faith, for what good, clean living can be and do, this is not what it had in mind.
BYU quarterback is about as famous, as high profile a sports position as there is across the church. No school or church leader intends to easily sit back and do nothing if and as that fame turns to infamy.
