Matt Bushman Describes Attitude Of BYU Football Team Heading Into 2019 Season

PROVO, Utah – BYU junior tight end Matt Bushman has experienced some high’s and low’s in his first two years with the Cougar football team.  The high’s have mainly come from personal accolades.  In 2017, Bushman was a freshman All-American tight end and last season, Bushman was the leading receiver for the Cougars.

But as a team, BYU has posted a record of 11-15 overall in Bushman’s first two seasons.  He wants that to change in 2019.

“We could have been a lot better than we were in the past two years,” Bushman said on KSL Newsradio’s Cougar Sports Saturday.  “That is disappointing for us and instead of just talking about it, we want to just put in the work and actually make it happen this year.”

In his first two seasons starting at tight end for BYU, Bushman has 1,031 receiving yards on 78 receptions for five touchdown grabs.  But you’re not going to hear much chatter from Bushman or his teammates about what’s happened in the past, they want to achieve something more in 2019.

“Instead of boasting, for most of us our plan is to just put in the work, put in the extra work -more than we’ve ever done before-, so that we can be put in a situation to make great things happen this year,” said Bushman.

For all the excitement that has been generated around BYU football after what took place at the end of last season, the last two years have been filled with many moments of inconsistency.  For every win against No. 6 Wisconsin on the road in Camp Randall, the Cougars then have no show’s against Washington and Utah State.  According to Bushman, the message for more work and less talking has come from the top of the program.

“People were asking, ‘why isn’t he (Kalani Sitake) boasting as much as he usually is, or he’s more reserved?’ It’s not about proving the doubters wrong, we just know we have been a lot better these past two years.”

Bushman has been fully cleared by team doctors to participate in team activities and is ready to go for fall camp which begins later this month. He was helping lead player run practices the past month before the team took two weeks off for a vacation.

Once fall camp hits however, the work will continue to be put in and there won’t be near the talking as there was in year’s past.

Listen to the full interview with BYU TE Matt Bushman on Cougar Sports Saturday below.

Mitch Harper is a BYU Insider for sports.ksl.com and host of the Cougar Tracks Podcast and Cougar Sports Saturday (Saturday from 12-3 pm) on KSL Newsradio. Follow him on Twitter: @Mitch_Harper.