A year ago, ESPN’s “College GameDay” staff was scrambling to get out of Lubbock, Texas.

Severe storms were rolling through the Great Plains. Tornadoes, hail and lightning had caused flights to be delayed at the nearest airports that were ... not so near after all.

Lubbock has a local airport — the Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport — with flights mainly going to Dallas, Austin, Houston and a few places out West. But if those flights get canceled, well, that can cause some trouble.

“Getting out of Lubbock, it’s not really close to a whole lot of places, and I think like the next major airport is like five hours away,” Jake Daigle, a “College GameDay” operations specialist, told The Salt Lake Tribune.

“Basically all of the airports got shut down, and we were all driving five hours plus to find a flight. Some of us were driving even further to try and either get home or get to the next airport, and as we were driving, flights were getting canceled left and right.”

Some were unlucky and had to stay in Lubbock until Wednesday.

A year later, many of those people are feeling pretty lucky to have an extended stay in Utah.

No. 2 BYU hosted the popular college football pregame show last week when the Cougars upset No. 4 Notre Dame in Provo.

ESPN decided to stay in the state, traveling just 40 minutes up the road to Salt Lake City and the University of Utah for the No. 10 Utes’ matchup against No. 14 Houston.

“On a normal season, we’re going everywhere,” Daigle said. “Being able to stay in the state of Utah, specifically, has been amazing.

“An hour drive between Provo and Salt Lake makes life super, super easy. I will say, after the grind of the first half of the season that we’ve experienced, this was a welcome break for our drivers.”

Some drivers and crew members have been able to go home for a few days — a rarity during the football season. Others, though, opted to stay in Utah for the week to enjoy a quasi-vacation.

Daigle is one of those who decided to stay, and he and the crew are getting a full taste of Utah.

Early in the week, the ESPN crew hiked Bell Canyon, taking in the remaining fall foliage and the rocky peaks of the Wasatch Front.

The group hiked the lower waterfall trail, a roughly 5-mile hike with an elevation gain of about 1,500 feet.

“The first two-and-a-half miles I was like, ‘I got this,’ and then that last half mile was straight vertical. It took me like an hour on the final way there. I was like, “Holy cow, that was crazy!’” Daigle said.

Hikes weren’t the only thing on the books.

On Wednesday, the crew planned a trip out to some hot springs, and the Bonneville Salt Flats was on the wish list as well.

They’ve also been to local favorites like Lucky 13 and Red Iguana — which, Daigle said, is always at the top of his list when he visits the state.

“We don’t get to do stuff like this all the time, so I think that was the added benefit of the layover,” he said.

It’s all part of the uniqueness of hosting “College GameDay” in the same state back-to-back. And the in-state rivalry between BYU and Utah only adds to that.

The Utes have an opportunity to one-up the Cougars’ showing from a week ago. Utah officials have spent the week asking ESPN what BYU did and how the U. can top it.

Topping the Provo “GameDay” could be a tall task.

BYU’s show was a hit.

ESPN announced that the broadcast from the BYU campus was the most-watched “GameDay” of the season and the third-most-watched regular-season episode ever.

“Our contacts here [at Utah] were like, ‘Hey, what did BYU do?’ or ‘Hey, how did they do this?’” Daigle said.

“They really respect BYU and what they do, but also you can tell that they really want to beat them, not just on the field, but by making this ‘GameDay’ even more spectacular.”

What exactly will that look like? Well, Daigle can’t disclose that information, but he can tease it.

“You’ll have to watch Saturday,” Daigle said. “There will be some fun hijinks here Saturday.

“I think we’ll have a couple extra things that we normally may not have.”

For a crew accustomed to packing up and moving on to the next campus, the back-to-back Utah stops have offered something rare: time to slow down and take it all in.

“Utah is such an unsung place,” he said. “More people need to come to Salt Lake and just see this part of the country because it really is something that is just not given enough credit.

“I was actually telling my wife this — but I don’t know how you guys work here at all. All I want to do is go disappear into the mountains and not work.”

The short trip allowed at least some time to do just that.