As a freshman, Richie Saunders played on what became the worst BYU team in nearly two decades.
The 2022-23 Cougars were a rebuilding bunch, finishing with a losing West Coast Conference record for the first time ever and failing to reach any sort of postseason play, let alone the NCAA Tournament.
But since that underwhelming debut campaign in Provo, Saunders has emerged as one of the great winners in program history. He has an All-Big 12 First Team selection and Sweet 16 appearance under his belt, along with 1,544 career points, the seventh-most of any Cougar since 2000.
Now as a grizzled senior, Saunders finds himself as the veteran leader of a No. 22-ranked BYU team that entered the year with sky-high expectations and Final Four aspirations — a far cry from where the program dwelt upon his arrival four years ago.
“I think back to one of the lows of losing at Pepperdine,” Saunders said Thursday on the “BYU Basketball with Kevin Young” show, referring to a 92-80 setback in 2023 to the then-last place Waves.
“Those moments of toughness have a way of teaching you, right? But just the progress of the program and this place as a whole, like, it’s been crazy. And it’s cool to be a part of it and see it firsthand.”
Saunders is already an all-time beloved fan favorite at BYU — “it’s really cool to just feel that support and that love,” he said.
But there were times where it appeared the Riverton native’s time with the Cougars could have come to a premature end.
Following his sophomore year, BYU head coach Mark Pope — who had recruited Saunders out of high school — left Provo for blue blood Kentucky.
Amid the coaching uncertainty, Saunders entered the transfer portal to weigh all of his options, and while a reunion with Pope seemed imminent at one point, he ultimately stayed put and pledged to new Cougars coach Kevin Young.
Then a year ago, after averaging 16.5 points per game and shooting 43.2% from 3-point range as a junior, Saunders flirted with an early entry into the NBA draft. But once again, he decided to finish what he started at BYU.
“Every time that there was a crossroads where we might have changed situations and stuff, I just kept getting drawn back (to BYU),” Saunders said.
“It’s something about playing for the team that I grew up loving and idolizing. There was my freshman year when I committed, the portal year when (Young replaced Pope), and then last year trying to figure out our next step. But I’ve been just so grateful for what this place has done for me and done to me. It’s crazy that it’s almost at an end, which I never thought it would be, but it’s been so many good things.”
Young is especially glad Saunders chose to remain a Cougar — not just because of the 17.5 points and 5.1 rebounds per game he’s provided across the past two seasons, but due to his example of perseverance and hard work leading to success.
“He’s a self-made guy. He’s a guy that just gets out of the mud and has just worked his way into being an unbelievable college basketball player, and has an extremely bright future ahead at the next level,” Young said of Saunders. “... He really is the benchmark of effort, and the way he plays the game is just remarkable.”
Saunders has found himself amid plenty of memorable highs at BYU, such as nine regular-season wins over ranked opponents along with last year’s NCAA Tournament run, but he says his favorite memory is sinking the go-ahead free throws in the final seconds to stun Arizona last year in Tucson.
Off the court, however, Saunders was part of something especially meaningful just a few months ago: his former high school and BYU teammate Fousseyni Traore being baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“That’s my little brother. ... That dude is one of my heroes in life,” Saunders said of Traore.
“I think one of the big narratives of BYU is right now (is) it’s moving away from the church, or maybe some sort of, I don’t know, elegant way to say that. But I think (Traore) is evidence of honestly the opposite. If we’re true to who we are as a program, really good stuff comes out of it.
“Being at that baptism and seeing his progress has been one of the coolest things of my life to this point.”
Saunders’ own faith has inspired him to serve others, traveling with his wife Sierra to Tahiti last year to host “Work With Faith” basketball camps for children there.
“We just wanted to help these young kids find something to latch on to like basketball did for us, to teach them how to be successful in life,” Saunders said.
“It’s really cool when you can find something to just dedicate so much time to and let God teach you through those things. We’ll figure out what this looks like in the future as we get this next chapter of life and have some more projects, but we just want to figure out how to help people, enjoy life and find God through those things.”
It’s been quite the ride for Saunders at BYU, but it’s far from over. With seven regular season contests left on the docket, he’ll continue climbing the program’s all-time statistical leaderboard and making his case for All-Big 12, All-American and NBA draft selection status, but the main task at hand is helping the Cougars win games.
BYU broke a four-game losing skid earlier this week at Baylor and now looks to get a second straight victory Saturday at home against middling Colorado.
Following Saturday’s matchup, five of the Cougars’ next six outings will be Quad 1 opportunities, giving Young’s crew the chance to bolster its NCAA Tournament résumé before heading to the Big 12 tournament.
This is the stage of the season where BYU’s dreams of a deep tournament run will either be realized or shattered, and Saunders is ready for such a challenge. The ending of his storybook career awaits.
“We got seven more regular-season games, and then we’ll get on with the just really fun times,” Saunders said.
“I’m just focused. I just want to finish this thing right and do something, do something really, really cool.”
