One of the great traditions in college sports is when West Virginia Mountaineers fans unite to sing “Take Me Home, Country Roads” at the end of a contest. The memory-filled path that takes people back to the place they belong, West Virginia, is also bringing one of their native sons back to Provo.
Brad Paisley will headline Stadium of Fire for the second time on Saturday, July 4, at LaVell Edwards Stadium. I’ve never met Paisley, but I share a friendly connection with the next closest thing — his dad, Doug.
Toward the end of BYU’s 2016 battle against West Virginia in Landover, Maryland, as Blaine Fowler and I were preparing to anchor BYUtv’s postgame show, a man decked out in Mountaineer gear approached us. He had an all-too-familiar look, and when he introduced himself, “Hi, I’m Doug Paisley!,” everything clicked.
The father of one of country music’s biggest stars, and his occasional bus driver, had stayed back to cheer on their beloved Mountaineers. Brad and the band performed in the area the night before and had gone on to the next tour stop. Doug rejoined them after watching West Virginia hold off Taysom Hill and the Cougars 35-32.
Neighborly love
The landmark game in Landover was the first meeting between the two programs, but it wasn’t the elder Paisley’s first interaction with BYU fans. While raising their family in Glendale, West Virginia, the Paisleys had Cougar fans living right next door.
“Harold Livingston. They called him ‘Buck.’ I think, he was the President of the Mormon Church in that area? We had a lot of interactions with the Livingstons,” Paisley told the “Y’s Guys” livestream show on Oct. 31, 2023.
“Were they nice?” I asked.
“Show me one that’s not?” Paisley said.
Paisley in Utah
A packed concert venue in West Valley City, Utah waited for Brad Paisley to take the stage on June 13, 2019. Storms had rocked the area, but the loyal crowd persevered.
“We’ve played several places in Utah, and it’s been good every time that we’ve come,” Doug Paisley said. “We are treated well. Everybody is nice.”
Just before his son fired up the band, I presented Doug with a BYU shirt and encouraged him to wear it when driving the tour bus. Four years later, I was thrilled to know the shirt was still accounted for.
“I do still have it and I have worn it. It’s been a couple of months. It’s in the bottom of the drawer, but I wore it to sleep in one night,” he said.
“I remember it distinctly because it was right after we found out BYU was coming to the Big 12.”
The Cougars joined the Big 12 in 2023 and have played West Virginia twice as conference foes. The Mountaineers routed BYU 37-7 in Morgantown in 2023, and BYU returned the favor last fall, prevailing 38-24 in Provo.
Cougar conversion
Over time, the ever-loyal Mountaineer and Paisley patriarch cleared some cap space for the Cougars.
“I’ve become a BYU fan, mostly because of you guys, but also because of the brand of ball that you play. You play great ball,” he told the “Y’s Guys” on Sept. 29, 2025. “I like your coach. I like his approach to the game.”
Brad Paisley headlined Stadium of Fire in 2015, and before he returns next month, he will have tour stops in Norway (this weekend), Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland.
Patriotic by their nature, the Paisleys will help celebrate America’s 250th birthday in Provo on July 4. Not sure if Doug will be wearing that Cougars shirt, but with 45,000 “Buck Livingstons” in the crowd, he is certain to feel back home again thanks to those country roads that link West Virginia and the Paisleys to BYU.
Dave McCann is a sportswriter and columnist for the Deseret News and is a play-by-play announcer and show host for BYUtv/ESPN+. He co-hosts “Y’s Guys” at ysguys.com and is the author of the children’s book “C is for Cougar,” available at deseretbook.com