Jaren Hall Won’t Make Excuses For The BYU Cougars
Oct 27, 2022, 2:54 PM | Updated: 3:49 pm
BYU vs USF kicks off on Saturday, September 3, 2022 at Raymond James Stadium. BYU QB Jaren Hall played here in his first career start in 2019. (Robert W. Grover, For The Deseret News)
(Robert W. Grover, For The Deseret News)
PROVO, Utah – BYU football is in a tough spot. They are riding a three-game losing streak and sit 4-4 on the year.
BYU takes on East Carolina this Friday night and the goal is to rebound and end its losing streak in order to get one step closer to becoming bowl eligible.
BYU quarterback Jaren Hall has no room for excuses for how this team has been playing the past few weeks. He joined Unrivaled for his weekly appearance and knows this team can play better, including himself.
“I have to be a better facilitator of the ball,” Hall said. “I don’t make excuses. I think it’s soft to make excuses. When things are going well and you think about past games where things didn’t go well and you let exterior factors play into your confidence and belief in each other.”
Hall is not sure why this team is performing the way it is. Losing does make people think and act in different ways when trying to figure things out. It quite possibly could be a confidence issue.
“[confidence] has never been something we struggled with in the past. Last year and our first couple of games this year we banded together,” Hall said. “We used to thrive in those adverse situations, and that’s when we played some of our best ball. For one reason or another, in the last couple of games that hasn’t been the case and we haven’t shown up mentally where we needed to.
“Why that is, I don’t know. We have great weeks of practice and come game day something’s not there. That is our focus this week to stick together and get through the adversity.”
East Carolina Will Be Motivated Against Jaren Hall & The BYU Cougars
BYU has a chance this Friday night against a non-Power 5 team as they host East Carolina. The Pirates are no slouch as they are sitting with a 5-3 record and coming off a pair of big program wins. Two weeks ago they topped Memphis in overtime and this past week easily defeated UCF, 34-13.
Now they come to a unique situation with a late October non-conference game and they will be pumped to face a future Big 12 team in consecutive weeks.
Pirates head coach Mike Houston realizes how tough a matchup this will be for his East Carolina team in facing BYU.
“This is going to be our toughest road test of the year Friday night,” Houston said. “Our players know that, our coaches know that. They are very focused on that. I expect us to have a great week of preparation, and I expect us to go out and play at a very high-level Friday night.”
Hall and his BYU teammates know that teams are coming after the Cougar name and brand for what it means nationally among college football fans. This game may not look as tough as compared to some this year like Notre Dame and Arkansas, but this BYU team did not look good against Liberty this past week and once again are facing a motivated team with a winning record.
As Hall said on Unrivaled, this team “banded together” last year and they need to do that again this week to snap its three-game losing streak and figure out how to win football games once again.
RELATED ARTICLE: What are the keys to a BYU victory against ECU? BYU Insider explains.
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