Three Thoughts On BYU Football’s 2025 Schedule
Feb 4, 2025, 3:53 PM | Updated: Feb 10, 2025, 5:31 pm
PROVO, Utah – We’ve had time to digest the 2025 BYU football schedule.
Here are three thoughts from the 12-game slate, and it starts with the placement of the rivalry game against Utah.
Big 12 needs to plant a flag on the BYU-Utah rivalry game
The October 18 date for BYU vs. Utah is strange. But hasn’t the dates for all of the meetings in this series been odd for the past 15 years?
It’s becoming more of a tradition to complain about the date of the BYU-Utah game than the game being played on the final week of the regular season.
10.18.2025 in Provo pic.twitter.com/hOtXuYrU4O
— KSL Sports (@kslsports) February 4, 2025
Since the two programs split from the Mountain West after the 2010 season, only one BYU-Utah game has appeared on the final weekend of a season (2018). Again, that split happened 15 years ago.
In an era where conferences are chasing the maximum number of bids in the 12-team College Football Playoff, I can get on board with an outside-of-the-box date for the rivalry. Heck, the ACC is considering holding a Championship Game in the future without its No. 1 team. Leagues are thinking of different ways to get more bids in the Playoff.
The problem with the BYU-Utah game is that the Big 12 is tossing this historic rivalry to random dates with no rhyme or reason.
If the Big 12 wants BYU-Utah to be the next Texas-Oklahoma series, plant the flag and make it a fixture as a mid-October game every year. The same goes for an early November contest or a more traditional Thanksgiving clash if they choose that again in the future.
Whatever weekend they land on, own it every year in a college football season and brand the rivalry to attract more fans outside the Big 12 footprint to watch this game.
Last year, playing the rivalry on November 9 created some heightened stakes.
BYU was undefeated and ranked No. 9 in the College Football Playoff rankings, while Utah was looking to get back on track and keep bowl eligibility alive. The game, which took place late at night, attracted a strong television audience.
Everyone who has been part of this rivalry knows it doesn’t matter when you line up BYU and Utah; the game will always live up to the hype. But don’t take that for granted.
The Big 12 needs to give the series an annual identity on the college football schedule that it has been sorely lacking since 2010.
BYU football lands an early bye week
BYU will have a bye in week three of the 2025 season. It’s the earliest bye week since the 2013 season. BYU was an FBS Independent program at that time.
Presenting, the 2025 @BYUfootball | @Big12Conference schedule, 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝚂𝙸𝙼𝙿𝚂𝙾𝙽𝚂 version.
Without further ado, eat my shorts. #GoCougs pic.twitter.com/ikt8kGaf1f
— Hemā Heimuli Jr. (@x_hems) February 4, 2025
It’s not an ideal spot for a bye week, as teams likely want to gain some momentum after playing a handful of games before the bye week.
The second bye of the season is one week after a road trip to Iowa State on October 25.
BYU will have six consecutive games between bye weeks, four of which are away from Provo.
The Big 12 typically gives teams byes after they travel two time zones for a road game. BYU’s East Coast trip to Cincinnati was scheduled for November 22, the season’s penultimate week, so a bye week after the trip to Cincy was not an option.
Six opponents on the 2025 BYU football schedule reached bowl games
Only six teams on BYU’s 2025 schedule reached the Bowl Season last year. Those teams include East Carolina, Colorado, West Virginia, Iowa State, Texas Tech, and TCU.
Out of those six opponents, four of them will be away from Provo for BYU football.
BYU travels to Texas Tech for the first time in 85 years. pic.twitter.com/MjARuWuMHl
— Mitch Harper (@Mitch_Harper) February 4, 2025
On BYU’s schedule, the six teams that didn’t reach the postseason last year include Portland State (FCS), Stanford, Arizona, Utah, Cincinnati, and UCF. Don’t be surprised if one or two of those teams becomes a much more challenging game than we think here in February.
Who would have thought a year ago that a trip to Tempe to face Arizona State would be a de facto play-in to the Big 12 Championship?
The Big 12 is a league that can produce quick turnarounds.
2025 BYU Football Schedule
* = Big 12 Conference game
August 30 – Portland State Vikings
September 6 – Stanford Cardinal
September 13 – BYE
September 20 – at East Carolina Pirates
September 27 – at Colorado Buffaloes*
October 3 (Friday) – West Virginia Mountaineers*
October 11 – at Arizona Wildcats*
October 18 – Utah Utes (Homecoming)*
October 25 – at Iowa State Cyclones*
November 1 – BYE
November 8 – at Texas Tech Red Raiders*
November 15 – TCU Horned Frogs*
November 22 – at Cincinnati Bearcats*
November 29 – UCF Knights*
December 6 – 2025 Big 12 Football Championship (Arlington, Texas)
Mitch Harper is a BYU Insider for sports.ksl.com and hosts the Cougar Tracks Podcast (SUBSCRIBE) and Cougar Sports Saturday (12–3 p.m.) on KSL Newsradio. Follow Mitch’s coverage of BYU in the Big 12 Conference on X: @Mitch_Harper.
