Kalani Sitake wants greater investment into BYU football program to compete in NIL era

Kalani Sitake wants BYU to step it up for the football program

When Sitake says "you kind of go through things," what he's talking about is Penn State's pursuit of him. He got a glimpse into what a blueblood Big Ten program looks like in terms of investment into making everything top of the line, and now he would like to see BYU match that level of intensity. 

He's not asking for the world, and again, it's not all about money. He clearly feels BYU needs to step up to really compete in the NIL and transfer portal era, though.

“That’s kind of where I’m at,” Sitake continued. “And I know it’s real because Penn State, the other schools that were talking to me, they kind of revealed it for me. And I’m not even asking for that stuff. It’s very simple stuff that’s very attainable.”

BYU has leaned on culture to recruit and retain athletes for a long time. It makes sense, too. Much like Notre Dame is a private catholic university, BYU is a private university tied to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 

Players and student-athletes have to belong to the LDS church to go to BYU, which can sometimes be a drawback on the recruiting trail. On the flip side, BYU has a massive in with elite recruits who also happen to belong to the LDS church.

It's two sides of the same coin, and while Sitake clearly believes that BYU's culture will always be its driving force...things are starting to look different in college football when the Indiana Hoosiers just spent close to $15 million on its 2025 championship team.

BYU just hasn't bought into that magnitude, but Sitake wants to see that change. He also believes more spending does not have to come at the expense of the Cougars' culture. 

“We’ve been given the challenge of doing the most with the least,” Sitake said. “So you lean heavily on culture to help you win. But I think there’s a way that you can actually increase your chances on both. I think there’s a way that you can get in deep culture and be really strong as a football team. There’s an opportunity that you can get to players that you normally wouldn’t have access to, so we’re trying to develop them. Sometimes, it happens in development with the right resources that you have … and then, all the resources that we would have available to them. That’s key. So it’s a bunch of factors that go into it."