Kalani Sitake just became the 14th head coach in BYU football history and has a 9-4 record to show for his first season. How does that record compare to the other 13?
Extremely well.
Granted, most BYU fans might not recognize a lot of the names of former head coaches other than the likes of LaVell Edwards, Gary Crowton and Bronco Mendenhall. So, here's how Sitake's first season at BYU compares to the 13 men who came before.
Alvin Twitchell: 1-5 in 1922
Even though BYU played some games as early as 1896, 1922 is the first official year that the Cougars played football, according to BYU's athletic website. That makes Alvin Twitchell BYU's first head football coach while he was also serving as BYU's head basketball coach.
Twitchell beat only one team in BYU's debut as a football program as the Cougars defeated Wyoming 7-0. It shows how far back the BYU vs. Wyoming series goes.
Charles J. Hart: 3-3 in 1925
C.J. Hart's best season was his first one in his short football coaching career. It was the first time BYU reached 0.500 with wins over Colorado College, Western State and Montana State. It would take two more years for Hart to win as many games as he did year one.
G. Ott Romney: 3-3-1 in 1928
G. Ott Romney was the first BYU head football coach to have experience as a college coach before coming to Provo. He had a 28-20-2 record coaching Montana Agricultural. Romney was the first BYU head coach to not have a losing season during his career.
Year one, Romney and the Cougars beat the College of Idaho, California Davis and Western State. BYU also tied with Utah for the first time in Romney's first year.
Eddie Kimball: 6-3 in 1937
Eddie Kimball was the first BYU football player to become head coach as he played for Twitchell back in 1922. His first team excelled at defense as it held Northern Colorado, California Davis, Western State, Wyoming, Utah State and Montana all scoreless that year.
And Kimball did all this while also coaching the basketball team and serving as BYU's athletic director. Kimball is also the only BYU head coach to be hired as BYU's head coach twice as he returned after World War II ended.
Floyd Millet: 2-5 in 1942
Floyd Millet has the distinction of being the shortest-serving head coach at BYU as he would be at the helm for just one season. BYU would temporarily suspend its football program due to World War II. And while Millet's only year as BYU's head coach wasn't very memorable, he did beat Utah 12-7 in Salt Lake.
Like many other early BYU football coaches, he also coached basketball and would go on to become the school's athletic director.
Chick Atkinson: 0-11 in 1949
Charles "Chick" Atkinson is the only BYU coach to ever have a winless season. Atkinson had just one winning season his entire career in Provo. The 1949 season was bar none the worst year in Cougar football history.
Hal Kopp: 2-7-1 in 1956
Hal Kopp was a reasonably successful head coach at Rhode Island before coming to BYU, finishing with a 28-11-2 record there and three conference titles. Unfortunately, his record at BYU wasn't nearly as good as he went 13-14-3 over three seasons. He did manage to beat New Mexico and Air Force in his first season in Provo.
Tally Stevens: 3-7 in 1959
There's a reason why BYU football fans don't remember the 1950s fondly. Tally Stevens was the latest disappointment head football coach for BYU as he lasted only two seasons as head coach.
Hal Mitchell: 2-8 in 1961
Hal Mitchell was the next coach to fail to have a winning season in his short time as head coach for the Cougars. The only two teams Mitchell managed to beat were Montana and Colorado State.
Tommy Hudspeth: 3-6-1 in 1964
Tommy Hudspeth doesn't get the credit he deserves for building up the program and making way for the success of his successor. Yes, his debut season wasn't anything special, but the Cougars would win their first conference title in school history just one year later.
LaVell Edwards: 7-4 in 1972
LaVell Edwards is the gold standard every other BYU head coach inevitably gets compared to. Edwards is the man who put the Cougars on the map and made them a college football powerhouse. He was also the first BYU head coach to have a winning season in his first year since 1937. While the Cougars didn't get to go to a bowl game in Edwards' first season, there would be plenty of those before Edwards would retire.
Notable wins in Edwards' first season include Kansas State and Utah.
Gary Crowton: 12-2 in 2001
Gary Crowton had by far the best first season in BYU football history. And if Luke Staley hadn't broken his leg against Mississippi State, the Cougars could have finished the season unbeaten. It looked like Crowton would build on the legacy that Edwards had brought to Provo. It seemed like the Cougars were in line to bust the BCS, and Cougar fans were asking when instead of if.
Three losing seasons later, Crowton would leave BYU as perhaps the most disappointing BYU head football coach ever.
Why was Crowton's first season so fantastic only to fall flat the next few seasons? Some point to the fact that Crowton won with Edwards' recruits, Staley being a perfect example. Others speculate that teams that were confused by Crowton's dynamic and trick-laden offense figured it out by year two and were ready for it. Of course, BYU's off-the-field issues didn't help and ultimately ended Crowton's all too short career in Provo.
Bronco Mendenhall: 6-6 in 2005
Bronco Mendenhall deserves a lot of credit for helping bring BYU back from the brink. He got the Cougars back to a bowl game for the first time since Crowton's first year. Yes, Crowton does deserve some credit too for bringing Mendenhall to Provo as a defensive coordinator, and Mendenhall did benefit from Crowton's recruiting.
This much has to be said about Mendenhall: He never had a losing season, went to 11 bowl games, finished ranked in at least one major poll five times and helped BYU make the difficult transition to football independence.
Kalani Sitake: 9-4 in 2016
A lot of fans will undoubtedly point to how painfully close BYU was to a special season in Kalani Sitake's first year. Eight points were the total difference in BYU's four losses this season.
But nine wins and a bowl victory with a brand new inexperienced coaching staff is nothing to sneer at. In fact, Sitake's first season is second only to Crowton's in school history.
Sitake's first season will go down as one of the wildest in BYU history with so many games coming down to the final seconds. It was a solid start to a new era in Provo. Here's hoping that there's even better things to come.