Photographing BYU Football Games

BYU tight end Isaac Rex celebrates a touchdown catch. I feel very lucky to have been in the right place at the right time to capture this moment.

When I was a kid I had a great affinity for sports – especially football. I remember in 5th grade when I brought a spare shirt to school for picture day so I could be free to dirty myself playing football during recess. I remember picking out an Arizona Cardinals Larry Fitzgerald jersey for Christmas and being so excited to wear it all the time. I remember enthusiastically watching Super Bowl XLII (42) on TV, cheering on the New York Giants as they ended the New England Patriot's near-perfect season winning record. ​I remember my dad taking me to all the BYU home football games for the 2009 football season and hearing the roars of LaVell Edwards Stadium.

As evident from my crazy hair, this is the 5th grade photo I described where I brought an extra shirt to wear for my picture so I could go all-out at recess playing football and not have to worry about looking dirty for my picture.

Skiing at age 11 in my new Larry Fitzgerald jersey (11 was a good number that year).

Left: David Tyree becomes an NFL legend making an impossible catch to set up the game-winning drive for the Giants. Right: Giants quarterback Eli Manning cheers at the success of his team, and is later given the MVP award for the game.

Max Hall led the '09 BYU football team to an 11-2 overall season record and ended the season ranked no. 12 in both the Coaches and AP polls.

Fast forward to 2021, I'm a photography student at Brigham Young University who just got hired to work as a photographer with BYU's school newspaper, The Daily Universe. Beyond standard responsibilities to make photographs accompanying news articles, ​I learn one of the bigger responsibilities of the photographer is to shoot all big sporting events, which of course included football!

This image came from my second BYU football game I photographed. I always hauled that big lens around at every game because I would get most of my best shots with it.

Below are all of my favorite photographs I've taken of the BYU football team in action for the 2021 season. I feel so lucky and blessed to have been a part of it.

​Go Cougs!