Orlando • BYU head coach Kalani Sitake has been around long enough to know a shakeup is always looming.
Former Utah coach Kyle Whittingham is now the focus of Michigan’s job search, ESPN reported on Friday. And if he ends up in Ann Arbor, Whittingham will inevitably take some assistants from his Utah days with him.
The Utes leader has deep ties to several BYU coaches on Sitake’s staff, including BYU defensive coordinator Jay Hill.
So how does Sitake feel about retaining his own staff amid this potential threat?
“I can’t foresee the future,” Sitake said on Friday morning. “I know that I have coaches on my staff who want to be head coaches, and most of those opportunities, they’ll come along. So I want them to be transparent as much as we can about it. But it’s going to be really difficult.”
Hill went to Utah and played for Whittingham. He also coached under his mentor for eight seasons before becoming the head coach at Weber State.
Hill has said he wants to be a head coach again, and the path for him to do so at BYU just became far more complicated after Sitake signed a long-term contract extension.
But a key part of that extension was adding resources for Sitake’s staff and top coordinators. Will that be enough to keep Michigan away?
Sitake isn’t sure.
But he believes the extension gives him better contingency plans if people like Hill do leave. BYU has several coaches per position, who have been learning under Hill and others.
“As we go through this, I just need to know how to sustain [winning],” Sitake said. “We’ve been given an opportunity to have more than one coach at a position. So you have a bunch of guys who already know what we are doing.”
Losing a playcaller, especially someone as valuable as Hill, can be more complicated to replace. But Sitake, who has experience being a defensive coordinator, said his program must be ready for whatever happens.
“You have it established, these are the calls that you’re going to make in such a certain situation. You allow the play caller to have a little bit of instincts to make that call. But as head coaches, we’re the ones that override all of it,” Sitake said.
He later joked, “I can be a jerk about it and say I am calling all three phases. I got it, leave me alone. But I do trust the guys who are there.”
Regardless of what happens, Sitake thinks BYU will be competitive enough to keep coaches in the coming weeks. He believes it’s a good sign for the program that Hill and others will be sought after.
BYU won 22 games in the last two years, on the cusp of the College Football Playoff.
“I’m really happy about the long-term deal, being able to establish a foundation and make sure that it’s sustainable and that we can overcome anything,” Sitake said. “Whether it’s losing coaches to opportunities. I mean, give them options. It’s great for them and their families. That’s a good sign that people want our coaches to become leaders and coordinators and be part of programs too.”