Schematically, the Big Ten challenges coordinators on both sides of the ball in so many diverse ways that I often say it feels like NFL Lite. The game planning, the matchups, the in-game adjustments and more. Add in four new head coaches who may end up as College Football Hall of Famers, and it only ramps up.

I’ve enjoyed studying all eight new Offensive Coordinators this offseason as each one is walking into a completely different scenario, and each has a QB who will scare every DC in the country. So with that, here’s the one thing I’m seeking from each new offensive playcaller and what I’ll be on the lookout for in training camp next week.

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And today, with Fresno State entering the new look Pac-12, that phrase is at the heart of my conversation with head coach Matt Entz.

Welcome to today’s episode of THE DAWN, a collaboration between and the Pac-12.

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Matt Entz first fell for Fresno State on a Saturday night in the Midwest, a young assistant watching the late ESPN game, checkerboard end zones on the screen, Pat Hill pacing the sideline. He’d GA’d for Coach Hill’s old line coach, so he had a rooting interest built in, and it stuck.

Now he leads this proud program and seventeen months into the job, he calls it Midwest California, blue collar mentality echoing the small Iowa town he grew up in. It didn’t take long to see the same thing in his own roster, blue collar young men who grew up dreaming about playing for the Bulldogs.

That dream now comes with a new league, the re-imagined Pac 12, and Coach Entz can feel the excitement building as September closes in. There’s pride in it and pressure too, elevating a program and an athletic department that’s now in Pac-12.

THE DAWN debuted July 1 across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

The highlight reels from Sean Lewis’s program show Snapdragon Stadium under the lights and the Warrior Shield held high. What they don’t show is a defensive back on his back in wet sand before sunrise, being reminded that paradise has a price when you play at San Diego State.

That’s the core of SDSU, and it’s led by Sean Lewis.

He joined today’s episode of THE DAWN, a limited series highlighting the re-imagined Pac-12, a collaboration between and the league.

I’ve known Coach Lewis since his days at Kent State when he was a 31 year old head coach, and it was clear then, just like it is now, that his philosophy is clear and his leadership style is one that will continue to thrive.

Two and a half years ago the giant was asleep. Now it’s a 9 win team, a 1st round NFL pick out the door, and a program that was in the CFP discussion last November.

Coach Lewis co-signs the idea without blinking that the champion of this new Pac-12 should be playing in the postseason in December.

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What’s underneath it all is the story behind Coach Lewis’s path to wearing a whistle.

He grew up on the south side of Chicago, went to Wisconsin to play quarterback and ended up at tight end. He was the head coach at Kent State by 2018, took a stop in Boulder to work with Deion Sanders, and two years ago this Midwest QB found himself leading the Aztecs out West. He didn’t draw this up. Nobody could have.

Life’s too short to huddle, he likes to say. One might argue life’s too short to plan out one’s path too. We just have to be present, enjoy the ride, and compete to impact people along the way.

Safe to say Sean Lewis is doing that, and much more, as San Diego State enters the new look Pac-12.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

THE DAWN debuted July 1 across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

I’ve called KJ Duff’s games the last two seasons, the one-handed grabs, the 241-yard afternoon against Purdue, but I’d never sat across from him until this past summer. So I did the only thing you might do if you met this star playmaker: I pulled up a video I knew he’d recognize and asked him to take me through it.

And that is where today’s podcast, fueled by our founding sponsor 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO, begins.

The video is a ten-year-old on a Long Island youth field wearing one blue glove and the ball naturally coming his way. He tipped it to himself, caught it, and the clip ended up in a Colin Kaepernick Nike commercial before he’d ever played a down of high school ball. “Numbers started calling,” he told me. “I didn’t really think it was real.”

No NIL check was waiting for him back then. We laughed about that. But what stuck with me wasn’t the play, it was how careful he’s been since not to let it define him. “I never want to come across as the cocky guy,” he said.

“Play Big.”

That’s the phrase his receivers coach, Dave Brock, has drilled into him since a summer camp before Duff’s sophomore year of high school, back when most programs looked at a 6-foot-6, 200-pound kid and saw a tight end. One school told him to get to 250. Duff knew better. Coach Brock knew better too, and told him so before there was ever an offer on the table: keep working, we’re gonna keep watching. That’s the relationship that outlasted every other recruiting pitch he’d get.

Because here’s what he told me that he hadn’t said out loud before: this offseason, he was ready to leave. He called Coach Brock. He called Coach Greg Schiano. Instead of a hard sell, they asked him a question, figure out what actually matters MOST to you, and he did it the way he does everything, with a notebook, pros and cons, still sitting in a drawer at home. “I could go play in front of 105,000 people somewhere else,” he said. “But that atmosphere alone isn’t going to get me to the NFL. The people I’m around, that matters.” He didn’t dress up how hard the process was. “Some of the most stressful times of my life,” he said. “Back and forth, back and forth.”

He announced he was staying at a Rutgers basketball game in front of the AD and the governor. The standing ovation caught him off guard. I think it was the building thanking a young man for choosing to be home. Not just being another name in the portal at a new school for 6 months, but a player who was thinking about bringing his own children back here one day to remind them that Chasing What Matters, with clarity, confidence and discipline is not easy, but it is worth it.

I asked him, finally, what his intention is for this season. No pause.

“First intention is I want to win,” he said.

Praise and blame are all the same. Legacy is the stat that compounds.

Go play big KJ, I’ll be rooting for you.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

The class was communication and rhetoric. The professor was Peter Simonson. I didn’t realize it then but I sure am now that that singular class, that singular professor shaped the trajectory of my life.

As I’m flying home, fully transitioning back to college football from a summer adventure in Europe, I am reading the media day headlines: Tampering accusations (Pitt). Defending a programs history (Clemson). A break away from the NCAA (SEC). You get it. The news.

Yet I keep thinking about my professor.

Back then I was nothing more, nothing less, than a Social Security number in a lecture hall of three hundred fifty students at Pitt. Then Professor Simonson started talking about Greek history. About the power of speech. About the Encomium of Helen.

I was hooked.

I started sitting in the front row. I started showing up to office hours. I fell in love with every lesson he taught.

That class became my major. That major became a career. Understanding dialogue, understanding how we communicate, understanding the history behind the words we choose. Being obsessed with it.

Like I mentioned, headlines are headlines. But the players who play and the teachers who teach are what I find myself coming back to somewhere across the Atlantic.

While it’s not going to make news, it is true that college football players still go to class.

‘Class’ may not look like it used to. Some of it is digital. Some of it runs through tutors. But the college experience is still happening for them, quietly, in between practices and game plans.

I know academia can sour on college sports, heck we all can. The money made. The money spent. It is easy to point at that and check out.

As the season is less than 50 days away I am asking you not to. Especially if you’re an educator on campus.

Professors, you still have influence. And the rest of today’s newsletter is for you.

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You still shape how these young people think, speak, and move through the world. A single lesson can change a life choice.

Many athletes we cheer for do not know how to navigate your classroom. They will not raise their hand first. They will not linger after class.

So invite them to office hours. Call on them, gently, before they ever have to raise a hand themselves.

I was that kid once. Quiet. Unsure. Just a number in a room of three hundred fifty.

One class hooked me. One professor mentored me.

As I trade summer vacation for six months of fall, I keep coming back to this.

To every professor standing in front of every athlete this season: you have more power than you know. So use it and maybe you can change a young athlete’s life…in September or 25 years from now.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

I’ve known Coach Schiano for over 20 years. First as a wideout at Pitt, then these last couple years covering Big Ten football. This conversation, though, was different because I was embedded within the Scarlet Knights program for the day and what a day it was.

I got to sit in on his team meeting, watch Coach Schiano look his players in the eyes and bridge a football lesson to a life lesson in the same breath. And at the end of an epic day with the team, staff and program he and I sat down, and Coach Schiano took me all the way back to where his leadership began: his kitchen table.

And that is where today’s podcast, fueled by our founding sponsor 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO, begins.

Coach Schiano grew up in an Italian household in Paterson, New Jersey, where his parents taught him and his three siblings one thing above all: you get up, you go to work, and some days it isn’t pleasant but you keep showing up. The standard, even before it was ever spoken, was simple — no matter what, protect your family.

That’s not a throwaway line for him. It’s the whole building now. “Family is everything to me in this building,” he said. And he means it literally, as he’s now recruiting the sons of players he coached at Rutgers when they were in the Big East while currently coaching with his own three sons on this year’s staff.

Full circle doesn’t begin to cover it.

This is the line that stuck with me most: “You can have a goal and at the same time have a purpose.” Greg’s goal is a national championship at Rutgers. His purpose is different.

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He is driven to make sure that the young men who walk into the Rutgers program leave as grown men. Husbands. Fathers. People who can figure it out when nobody’s telling them what to do next. In this era of players getting paid, transferring and being told things from others that may not be accurate I have to say that watching Coach Schiano teach his players the realities of LIFE and how football can teach all of us how to navigate life was one of the most refreshing parts of my off-season.

He didn’t plan on coaching, by the way. He got cut playing in the CFL, came home, signed up for the LSAT, and was on his way to law school when his high school coach — practically a second father to him — talked him into helping out on the sideline instead. That coach later “fired” him, on purpose, so Greg would go be a graduate assistant and learn the business the right way. That GA year? 1989. At Rutgers. Where he told me, without blinking, that even back then, he was building his coaching staff for this program in his head.

Chop.

If you’ve followed this program at all, you know the word. Here’s where it actually comes from: 1999, Miami, a sports psychologist named Dr. Kevin Elko telling the staff a story about a guy in the woods with nothing but an axe. It sat dormant for six years. Then in 2005, Rutgers blew a 28-7 fourth quarter lead at Illinois and lost in overtime. Greg couldn’t sleep on the flight home. He remembered the story, upon landing he sent a GA to Home Depot for an axe, had it painted red, and walked it into the team meeting still wet with paint. We’re all in the woods. We can lay down, or we pick a tree and chop until it falls. Rutgers went on a run and made a bowl game. The axe, and the word, never left.

Finally, Rutgers has both hands free.

For most of his 18 years split across two stints as head coach, Coach Schiano described competing “with one arm tied behind his back.” That’s changing. He talked about vertical alignment: from president to athletic director to head coach, all pointed at the same goal, for the first time in his tenure.

It’s showing up in real terms: Rutgers retained all three of their must-keep players this offseason, including a receiver who very nearly left before Greg reminded him who he was and where he was from. “You’re a difference maker. You’re gonna leave a legacy,” he told him. He stayed. That conversation with KJ Duff is coming up later this week so be sure to subscribe to our YouTube page.

We also talked about his three coaching trees and biggest influences: Joe Paterno at Penn State, Dave Wannstedt and Butch Davis out of the Jimmy Johnson lineage at Miami and Chicago, Dick Anderson at Rutgers. We talked about Pete Carroll and impact of our book, Win Forever, and the sabbatical Greg took in 2014 that reshaped how he leads now.

Demanding, but flexible enough to let a coach leave for four hours for his daughter’s recital. And we talked about his three sons, all working in the building, all grinding it out the long way.

He just turned 60. Says he feels 30. And when I asked him about the word “legacy” landing on him after everything he’s built here, he wouldn’t take it yet. “I’m only comfortable with it because we haven’t started yet,” he said. “The best times for Rutgers football are ahead of us.”

I believe it.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

The first-year Washington State head coach grew up two hours away from Pullman, would visit spring practice with his Dad as a child and opens up his head coaching career in the Apple Cup on NBC. Talk about a dream script!

He joined today’s episode of THE DAWN, a limited series highlighting the re-imagined Pac-12 in a collaboration between Y-Option and the league.

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What’s clear in our conversation is how proud he is to be leading the Cougs, has an incredible understanding of the standard at WSU, and has hit the ground running since taking over this proud program.

He shared insights from mentors like Chris Petersen, Kalen DeBoer, Jeff Tedford and others, let alone what it was like growing up in the same home as the current Saints head coach, Kellen Moore.

I’ve visited the Cougs in Pullman since he took over and can attest that his attention to detail, alignment on campus and the players’ focus will have the Cougs prepared for the 2026 season that kicks off on NBC.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

THE DAWN debuted July 1 across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

I’ve been tracking Coach Kinne since his recruiting days as a big-time QB prospect, and he’s been on a rocket ship in the coaching profession from the moment he traded his cleats for a whistle.

After sitting down with him it's clear he has an ‘It Factor’ that's translated straight into coaching, and that comes through during our conversation in the limited series, THE DAWN, presented by the Pac-12 and Y-Option.

Coach Kinne inherited a program that had never reached a bowl game, never beaten rival UTSA, and never notched a Power Four win. He got all three done in year one, and he credits it to instilling confidence and an aggressive, swing for the fences mindset from the start.

Coaching runs in GJ’s blood. His father spent decades as a Texas high school coach, and GJ played and worked under a run of respected names including Todd Graham, Gus Malzahn, Chad Morris, Mike Norvell, Chip Kelly, Ryan Day, Bill Musgrave, and Jeff Stoutland. But it was Super Bowl winning coach Doug Pederson who gave him advice early on that stuck: just be yourself.

That philosophy has carried him through head coaching stops at UIW and now Texas State as they enter the reimagined Pac-12.

Watching Coach Kinne build this thing from the ground up, I keep coming back to the same thought: the rocket ship isn’t slowing down anytime soon.

THE DAWN debuted July 1 across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

I heard about Pancho Laloulu when he signed at Oregon. And I’ve interviewed him many times calling his games during his All-American career. But it wasn’t until today’s podcast where I truly felt I got to know him.

You will too, as he shares the story of how he lost his baby brother and the lifelong impact that has had on him and his view of the world.

Pancho was in fourth grade and woke up to yelling in the middle of the night to find his older brother performing CPR on their 11-month-old sibling, Mai. The light of that house. The one who greeted everyone at the door with a smile after school.

Pancho and his family lost him that morning.

And after that Pancho didn’t get quiet, didn’t get resentful. Rather, he got grateful.

That word, grateful, kept coming through in our conversation on today’s podcast, fueled by our founding sponsor 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO so you never miss a beat.

As an All-American in 2025 and projected All-Everything in 2026, he lives with the lens that every day above ground is a gift.

Pancho’s path to center is one he almost refused to go down as a freshman. He envisioned himself playing guard, mauling people and leading the Ducks O-line. But when it came, he took it. And when it was hard and taken away, he went back to work.

Heading into 2026 the Duck’s offensive line, once again, is a frontrunner for the Joe Moore Award and Pancho is the centerpiece of it under Coach Dan Lanning. And like Dante Moore, Pancho chose to return for 2026, as this roster is mission minded.

I’ve written about Coach Lanning’s DNA traits often: Connection. Growth. Toughness. Sacrifice. And Pancho is living them at every turn, with every block.

Hope you enjoy today's conversation. We are also grateful for your support as we continue to grow Y-Option here at Substack and on our YouTube channel.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

And without meaning to, he started running an experiment on himself. Every time someone reached out, he noted who it was and why. Former players, coaches, administrators, boosters, church, family. He wasn’t trying to prove anything. He just wanted to know who showed up.

Over ninety percent of it came from former players. And out of all those messages, only one mentioned a game or a score. Every other one was about a moment. Something they overcame. Something that changed them.

That’s the story underneath everything Coach Mendenhall does, and it’s the centerpiece of this episode of THE DAWN, a limited series presented by the Pac-12 and Y-Option.

Coach Mendenhall is the fourth winningest active coach in college football, twenty years in, four programs, over a hundred players sent to the NFL, most of them three star recruits or less. And he’ll tell you the wins were never the point. He says it constantly. Culture precedes performance. He means it literally, not as a slogan.

His first team meeting at every stop starts the same way. He tells the room this will be the highest performing football team in school history academically, and it starts now. They usually think they got the wrong coach. Twice now, it’s been true by the end of the semester.

There’s a theory he leans on, that the brain signals us to quit around sixty percent of our real capacity, purely to protect itself. Coach Mendenhall’s entire program lives in the other forty. Not through fear. Through belief, and through asking more of people than they thought they had.

Now he’s bringing all of that into a brand new conference, in a state that can’t get enough football, with a program built on earning everything and given nothing.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

THE DAWN debuted July 1 across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

There’s a switch.

Calm. Cool. Collected. Right up until the moment practice starts.

Then it flips.

Oregon State head coach JaMarcus Shephard will tell you his players saw it for the first time in their first practice together in Corvallis. The room changed. The temperature changed. Guys who thought they knew their new head coach realized, mid-drill, that they didn’t. Not yet.

That’s the story of Oregon State right now. And in a lot of ways, it’s the story of the entire new Pac-12.

Welcome back to THE DAWN, a limited series within Y-Option as we partnered with the Pac-12 as they re-launch this historic conference.

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Coach Shephard is the 33rd head coach in Oregon State history, but he’s really the first head coach of something else entirely. A rebuilt league. A rebranded identity. A program that spent a stretch of time in what he calls limbo, watching the old Pac-12 come apart, wondering if it would even survive.

He’s done wondering. He’s building.

What stuck with me most wasn’t the energy, though there’s plenty of that. It was the discipline underneath it. Coach Shephard has a rule he lives by, and he tries to instill it in every player who walks through the building: never let a negative thought complete itself in your mind. Because your thoughts become your words. Your words become your actions. And how you think about where you’re at determines how you perform.

Simple. Not easy. That’s usually how the best ones are.

And when you look at his coaching tree, it’s crystal clear how Coach Shephard has developed as a leader of men.

Willie Taggart. Bobby Petrino. Jeff Brohm. Kalen DeBoer. And Mike Leach, gone too soon, but never far from how Coach Shephard talks about caring for people. Each one left something behind. Not just plays. Not just systems. A way of being present with the people in the building, whether that’s a wide receiver room or an entire athletic department.

Then there’s the Alabama experience. Walking into Nick Saban’s infrastructure post National Championship game at Washington taught him something he didn’t expect: that even at a place with all the talent in the world, development is the real separator. Not just recruiting rankings. The daily work of making players better than they arrived.

He’s carrying all of it into this new league launch. And he’s not shy about the moment.

Oregon State and Washington State were the two programs that refused to let the Pac-12 disappear. Shephard gives real credit to both universities for planting a flag when it would have been easier to walk away. That decision is why there’s a conference to relaunch at all.

And here’s the part that got me. Shephard already has a Pac-12 championship. He won the last one, with Washington, before the old league dissolved. Now he gets a shot at winning the first one in the new era. Not chasing someone else’s history. Building his own, from the ground up, with a staff that includes people who were in the room for that final title.

That’s rare. Most coaches inherit a legacy. Shephard gets to create one.

If you missed episode 1 with Commissioner Teresa Gould or ep 2 with Jim Mora be sure to subscribe to our YouTube Channel as THE DAWN continues all month in collaboration with the Pac-12 Conference.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

THE DAWN debuted July 1 across the Pac-12's YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league's 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

Who in here did Steve Brennan ever buy an ice cream? Every kid’s hand went up.

Who in here did Steve Brennan ever buy a beer? Eight hundred hands went up.

That’s not just a powerful eulogy. That’s a blueprint.

I sat across from Coach Brennan in Tucson this spring, and it hit me fast. This isn’t a coach who learned relationships from a leadership seminar. He learned it at the dinner table. And now, three years into rebuilding Arizona football, that same instinct is the whole operating system.

Year one was hard. Year two was a breakthrough. Year three carries a different kind of weight. Brent told me the team still feels unfinished. Not disappointed but rather, hungry.

I love asking head coaches what they feel the ‘role of a head coach is’ and with Coach Brennan, when asked that he never starts with schemes.

He starts with trust and how the core of trust is real relationships, and how real relationships don’t exist without time. Time with him, time with his family, time with his staff.

Today’s conversation is fueled by our founding sponsor 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO so you never miss a beat, which feels about right for a coach whose recruiting calendar, staff meetings, and family dinners never really stop overlapping.

As Big 12 media days kick off, I also hope that Arizona’s QB gets the love he has earned as Noah Fifita’s story is rare.

Coach Brennan said he’s never coached a player as high profile as Noah Fifita who still shakes every hand, signs every autograph, and shows up to coach youth football on Sundays like it’s the most important appointment of his week.

In an era defined by the transfer portal, Noah stayed. He grew. He bet on Tucson. Add in elite accuracy, real ability to “see the defense,” and a willingness to do whatever it takes to win Fifita has Arizona in position to win the Big 12 this fall.

Take a listen to my earlier conversation with Noah to learn about the QB that I think the nation will be rooting for.

Coach Brennan and I also dove into expectations and he shared the dangers of looking too far down the road, of chasing a title before you’ve won today’s meeting, today’s rep, today’s practice. And after being there this past off-season it’s clear that his team is stacking the small things, and the big things should take care of themselves this fall. (hello week 2 vs BYU!)

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And on a personal note, his wife Courtney changed my life, literally.

Most importantly, she has been by Coach Brennan’s side since he was a high school coach and as a graduate assistant washing cars and babysitting for extra cash. The players love her too as she defines showing up.

But years ago, I was visiting the San Jose State program and her and Coach Brennan convinced me to stick around an extra night. It wasn’t that hard if you’ve ever met the Brennan’s. So instead of catching my flight home, I stuck around and as the universe would have it, that next day I walked onto a plane and sat next to my future wife! So yea, football gives us a lot of things but for me, it gave me the introduction to my absolute heartmate.

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Three years in, Brent Brennan isn’t chasing hype. He’s chasing alignment and he’s done it one relationship at a time and that’s the legacy this Arizona program is chasing. Not a trophy first, but rather a room full of raised hands.

And this week as Big 12 Media Days continue today, the nation gets to see it on full display.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

Jim Mora lives it.

Every job. Every challenge. Every program down on their luck handed to him with a handshake and a good luck. He doesn’t flinch. He leans in. And he loves it.

Coach Mora grew up in Seattle with mountains everywhere and vistas saying, can you get there? As you might imagine, he never stopped answering that question in the coaching profession.

I’ve known Coach Mora for almost 15 years and what struck me most in today’s podcast was that his essence, at this stage, is about impact and in this conversation, you can feel the intentionality behind that mission.

He arrived at Colorado State with nineteen players from UConn and a gut feeling. Not blind optimism. Earned optimism as he’s done the reclamation project before and he knows what it feels like when it’s working and he knows how to set and maintain a standard. (Hey IU fans, does that remind you of someone?)

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From the players to the staff to the kid folding towels at six in the morning. It’s real. And in the latest episode of THE DAWN, presented by the Pac-12 and Y-Option, Coach Mora’s mission will inspire you with relative ease to Chase What Matters in your own life.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

THE DAWN debuted on July 1 across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

I thought about that as our country celebrates its 250th birthday while I’m in another country on vacation.

I thought about it even more when I reminisced at the golf tournament I was fortunate to host last week for Joey Harrington’s Safeway Foundation Battle at Bandon. It’s the 14th year that Joey has hosted it and it was an all-time event.

The playing field was made up of players from all over the Big Ten. Household names like Ki-Jana Carter, Mike Alstott, Tim Dwight, Jonathan Ogden, Eric Crouch and more. Men who earned huge cheers and also received loud boo’s. And men who, decades later, are still admired.

For me, it was amazing. I’m not a great golfer but I got to learn the game at Bandon Dunes, bring the real golfer in my family (my wife Amy), and spend three and a half days with players I used to pretend to be in the backyard as a kid, like O.J. McDuffie.

As the weekend went on I listened to Danny Farmer crack jokes and was in awe as Jonathan Ogden walked with a humility that felt almost unknown for someone who’s probably the best there’s ever been at what he does. I laughed with Tim Dwight and learned the story of Brad Banks. I took notes listening to Dhani Jones explore philosophy and connected with Joey Galloway, who we all watch each Saturday night in the fall. And I got to go down memory lane with Matt Barkley, who I recruited to USC back in the day.

At one point on the final day, I watched all these players walk past the 10th hole, where they’d get interviewed by our production crew, and I thought to myself: I wish people from all over the USA could see this.

We’ll air an hour show on Big Ten Network and it will be incredible, but to be there, to feel it, was something I miss quite often.

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Teresa Gould had something else. She had conviction and a vision.

In two short years, Commissioner Gould built back a team of 30 who raised their hands and stayed while navigating a rebuild that nobody had a roadmap for. And she did it while trusting her team and leaning on her 36 years of experience in college athletics.

Now the historic league is back. Nine schools. A new logo. A new season on the horizon. And we are celebrating that with a new series titled THE DAWN, presented by the Pac-12 and Y-Option.

Ten episodes. Eight head football coaches. One commissioner. And a never-before-seen short film from behind the scenes of the rebuild. All of it candid, all of it in-depth where we cover culture, leadership, expectations, and the vision driving the next chapter of Pac-12 football.

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For those of you who have been with us at from the jump, this series is for you. We are grateful for your support, the community we’ve created here at Y-Option and the love for college football that we all share.

For those just joining this newsletter, we hope to bring you thoughtful insight into college football and THE DAWN seems like a great place to start. Hope you enjoy Commissioner Teresa Gould as she opens up on resilience, reinvention and what it took to bring the Pac-12 back.

After all, who doesn’t love a comeback story?

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

THE DAWN will debut today across the Pac-12’s YouTube and Pac-12 Insider, the league’s 24/7 FAST channel. The series culminates with a finale featuring never-before-seen behind-the-scenes content from the building of this new league. It drops in August, right before the season kicks off.

This week’s episode of is with a QB who knows that better than most - Demond Williams Jr of the Washington Huskies.

Demond heads into year three at UW with a chance to be one of the most dynamic players in America and in my eyes, is the most challenging quarterback to prepare for in the nation.

As always, each episode of Y-Option is fueled by our founding sponsor, 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO so you never miss a beat.

Demond and I sat down at the Elite 11 Finals, where he was pouring into the next generation of quarterbacks as a counselor. It was a full circle moment as Demond was a camper there himself. When he showed up in high school I shared the same note with him as we shared with every QB each summer: the only guarantee is that your path will not go as you envision it.’

That’s the thing about playing QB, the path never goes as planned.

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This past off-season tested Demond in a way most people will never experience, but all have an opinion on. For the UW star, what came on the other side of a hectic 48 hours wasn’t bitterness. Rather, it was growth.

He and I talked about leaning on his faith. His family. His support system. About having to go back and rebuild relationships, brick by brick, and how that work shaped the leader he’s become. Not a quieter version of himself. A more outspoken one with an edge.

And the difference shows up in the small moments. Where he used to stay after practice throwing extra routes, now he’s just as likely to be hanging with his teammates. One might say they are building the culture from the inside out. That’s not an accident. That’s a veteran understanding what actually wins football games.

His bond with Jedd Fisch is 4 years deep now. Built on trust. Built on what they call PCP in their offense: play caller purpose. Knowing exactly what’s being asked, then making it happen.

Washington has a loaded schedule this fall. The Apple Cup to open on NBC. A trip to USC. Penn State at home. Indiana at home. Finish in Eugene. Overall, a real chance to make noise in the Big Ten and push toward the Playoff conversation.

And I can’t wait to get there to see it in person week 1 as the season is right around the corner.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

The Auburn quarterback sat down with us at the Elite 11 Finals in LA, and what you notice first is the presence. Not the stats. Not the ranking. The presence.

That presence joined today’s episode of , fueled by our founding sponsor 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO so you never miss a beat.

He talked about the injury that stopped everything. The redshirt season that had him flying, then the fracture that brought him all the way back to the most basic question an athlete can ask: Am I going to be the same?

He answered it. And the answer is on the field. And this fall it will be at Auburn.

But what stayed with me is what he said when I asked what he wants people to know about who he actually is, beyond the arm talent and the production. No hesitation.

Just this: a guy who loves his family, loves his teammates, loves soaking everything out of every single day.

That’s not a recruit pitch. That’s a foundation.

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Byrum Brown is one to watch. Not just because of where he’s going. But because of how he’s going there.

Also, if you missed the first episode of our QB Conversations, be sure to watch Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele.

Thanks for the support and if you’re not, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel as we continue to compete to bring insightful conversations to college football.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

I never did. Until our Mom died.

He showed up every day for her. Drove her to the doctors. Helped her in and out of bed. He was there, fully present. If you’ve ever met Will Roth, that’s how he rolls. In the moment at all times.

In our Mom’s final weeks, late at night, he would sit beside my two siblings and I on the couch and talk about her. And cry. What would start as something small would become a sound I will never escape.

I’m glad I can’t.

Because here’s what I’ve come to believe: men struggle with emotion and we are generally terrible at self-compassion. And most of us, Dads especially, learned somewhere along the way to keep it moving, keep it together, keep the mask on.

If you disagree, feel free to unsubscribe. If you’re nodding, let’s keep going.

My Dad raised three kids who are happy, healthy and chasing their dreams. He did it largely through phrases. We call them Willisms.

Love many, trust few and paddle your own canoe.
A fool and his money are soon parted.
A penny saved is a penny earned.
Man is made to move, and we move through things.

Those lines are engraved in my siblings’ and my souls. And for most of my life, those have carried me. But 12 years ago I felt the urge to learn about the stories behind those phrases.

So I asked him to for a walk…in Portugal and Spain…along the Camino de Santiago.

And walk we did. About 15 miles a day with our bag, our energy and our collective curiosities.

What came from that walk was powerful memories as well as the first film I ever directed titled, Life in a Walk. The premise was simple: I needed to actually know my Dad. Not the father. The man.

It began in Porto, Portugal and ended in Santiago de Compostela, Spain. Fifteen miles a day. Just us and two future friends with cameras and every question I’d never thought to ask.

The production plan was rather simple: each night I’d interview him for an hour about a different decade of his life. And every morning we’d lace up and do it again.

I was nervous going in. I’d produced documentaries before but never directed. Never ran the show. But more than that, I wasn’t sure what I’d find.

What I found blew me away.

One afternoon I asked him how he navigated having prostate cancer. He didn’t flinch. Didn’t pause. Just said:

Man is made to move, and we move through things.

That was it. No war story. No drama. Just clarity.

And I realized that my Dad hadn’t been holding things in. I just hadn’t asked.

This past week I was at the NBC Sports headquarters and inside the Rutgers football program. Two completely different worlds with one thing in common: the people who lead both places are also the ones willing to go beneath the surface.

Greg Schiano’s program is built upon the word CHOP. Keep chopping the tree. You don't know when it falls. You just keep swinging, fully present, focused only on what's right in front of you.

My Dad never used that word. But he lived it.

Fifteen miles a day. One question at a time. He gave me everything. Not because he pushed it on me, but because I finally showed up and asked.

So here’s what I want for you today, on Father’s Day.

Not the golf round or the sleep-in or the perfect gift from your partner, kids, friends —though take all of those, you’ve earned them.

I want you to call your Dad. Ask him something you don’t know the answer to. Or if he’s gone, share one of his lessons with your kids today and tell them where it came from.

And if you’re a Dad reading this: let something show. You don’t have to fall apart. But you also don’t have to hold it all together every second.

The moment my father cried, really cried, was the moment I understood him most. It was the moment I understood the love he had for our Mom. The moment I comprehended that an agape love is possible. That it’s powerful. That it can rip your heart out.

And that it’s worth it.

Because he went for it, as a father and husband. Fully. Without reservation. Nearly fifty years of showing up for one person, and when it mattered most, he let us see what that meant to him.

That’s not weakness. That’s the whole point.

So go for it. With your kids. With your partner. With the people who need to see the real you.

And if you need a nudge, just go for a walk.

Much love and stay steady,

Yogi

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He was a three star recruit who showed up at the Elite 11 and became a legend in the 28 year history of the premiere QB event in football.

At every turn JSK took the opportunity he was given and never looked back.

He shared many of those in today’s conversation, fueled by our founding sponsor 76, keeping you on the GO GO GO so you never miss a beat.

Two years ago at the Elite 11 finals, he went throw for throw with Dillon Gabriel - a counselor that year, as well as a former state record holder in Hawaii and a QB Jaron-Keawe had watched since middle school. They could have gone throw for throw all night. Trust me, I was front and center. In the end, Gabriel graciously stepped aside and Jaron-Keawe won the rail shot challenge.

It was clear watching it - something shifted in that moment.

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Looking back, in that moment a three-star kid from Hawaii had just introduced himself to the country.

When I asked Jaron about that moment, he was direct. He came in with the mindset that he was going to win it. No asterisk. No footnote. Just belief, out loud.

Last year he started as a true freshman, taking over for Fernando Mendoza, who ended up winning the Heisman Trophy and being drafted #1 overall. We spoke about that journey, and what it was like to have his head coach, Tosh Lupoi sleep outside his home the night he was named Cal's head coach.

This conversation will inspire the quarterback who isn’t getting the attention he deserves - and nudge the highly recruited ones to keep working, because the craft is never complete.

Hope you enjoy it. And be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more conversations at the heart of college football.

Much love and stay steady

Yogi

Free fun.

It never made much sense to me then. Now it’s woven into the fabric of our family.

This past weekend, we were embedded in it.

Location: Malibu. The challenge: camping. We’ve never camped before as a family. Football season, there’s no chance. The offseason, we like to travel. Big trips, new places. We’ve never just stayed local.

This past weekend, we did just that and camped, literally, on the sand.

A few of my colleagues were quick to remind me over the weekend that it wasn’t real camping. Maybe. It wasn’t the camping I grew up with in Northeastern Pennsylvania. But it was surely the camping I think many of us dreamt of when we imagined California.

And there we were.

Bonfire in front of us. Family all around. Connecting with neighbors setting up their tents nearby. Fighting wind gusts that no one warned us about. The kind that make pitching a tent feel like a genuine athletic event.

As the sun set, the stars showed up, and the s’mores were aplenty.

I just kept thinking: life goes so fast.

If we don’t capture these moments, these shooting stars, this space between birthdays and anniversaries, we’ll miss them entirely.

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Football season is right around the corner. I can’t wait for our opener. Can’t wait to get back on the road, learn new stories, take the helmet off, dive into scheme, delve into opponents, game plans, coaches. For all of us who love college football, that fire is not just burning in us - it’s likely about to roar.

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