The System: The Glory and Scandal of Big-Time College Football (29 page)

On April 29, 2008, Bronco Mendenhall stepped to the pulpit at a Mormon church in Reno, Nevada. He wasn’t there to talk football. His topic was faith. But the event had been billed as an evening with BYU’s head football coach—a devotional. On that night in Reno, as Mendenhall looked out at hundreds of kids—girls in modest dresses and boys in white shirts and ties—his eyes were drawn to the one at the very back of the hall. He looked different from the others in every way—taller, well built, sporting an Afro, and wearing a long black peacoat. When Mendenhall made eye contact, the boy returned his gaze with a skeptical, hard stare. It was clear this kid didn’t want to be there.

That boy was Kyle Van Noy, then a sixteen-year-old junior linebacker and wide receiver at Reno’s McQueen High. Arguably the best all-around athlete in the state of Nevada, he had recruiting letters from the top football programs in the country—LSU, Nebraska, Oregon, UCLA and twenty others. BYU had written and called him, too. But he had ignored the Cougars. Despite being a Mormon, Van Noy had zero interest in playing for his church’s university. “I didn’t like anything that had to do with BYU,” Van Noy said.

Nor did he care to hear what Mendenhall had to say. “I didn’t want to be there that night,” Van Noy recalled. “My parents made me go. I figured it was going to be another talk about church stuff.”

Instead, Mendenhall talked about geese flying in V formation, taking turns at the point and never abandoning a member of the flock. He had Van Noy’s undivided attention.

“He taught us that if one goose fell off and was unable to fly, another goose would wait with him until he either died or was able to rejoin the group,” Van Noy recalled. “At that time I felt so alone. And it felt like he was talking directly to me. I had never heard a football coach talk like that.”

Afterward, Mendenhall introduced himself. A friendship was struck.

“I had a clear impression when speaking and looking at him that night,” said Mendenhall. “I said to myself: ‘He needs to be at BYU.’ ”

Months later Mendenhall made an in-home visit. There he met Kyle’s parents, Layne and Kelly. In 1991 they adopted Kyle weeks after he was born in Las Vegas. Devout Mormons, the Van Noys were living in California when they received a call from LDS Family Services, which assists Mormon families with adoption.

For the first two years of Kyle’s life he wore corrective leg braces. At night he wore a bar fastened to his shoes in order to keep his legs apart. In the morning the toddler would climb out of his crib, crawl down the hall GI Joe–style and enter his parents’ bedroom, the bar still fastened to his shoes. The impediment forced him to use only his elbows to pull himself from one end of the house to the other. That’s when Layne and Kelly realized that their adopted son had an unusually determined spirit.

Eventually, the leg braces came off, and the Van Noys relocated to Reno, where Kyle blossomed into a three-sport star athlete. While he remained close to his parents during high school, Kyle became less comfortable around his fellow Mormon teens. Instead, he ran with kids who partied and drank. He felt more accepted by them.

Van Noy shared all of this, as well as other personal challenges he was facing, with Mendenhall during the in-home visit. “He didn’t hide anything,” Mendenhall said. “He was sincere and truthful. He just said, ‘I’ve done this. I’ve done this. I struggle with that.’ He was very blunt.”

Mendenhall was equally blunt, telling Van Noy that he would be required to live every aspect of the honor code if he accepted a football scholarship to BYU. “BYU is a unique place,” Mendenhall said. “I told Kyle who we are and that it’s not for everyone. I was pretty clear about what he was getting into if he chose BYU.”

Jim Snelling was Van Noy’s defensive coordinator at McQueen High. A former player at Nevada, Snelling had coached plenty of kids who earned Division I scholarships, including a couple who went on to successful careers in the NFL. But he had never seen a player quite like Van Noy. “His acceleration from a standing-still position is remarkable,” Snelling said. “At the snap of the ball he just explodes. All the college recruiters saw this when I sent out film on him.”

By his sophomore year, Van Noy had a scholarship offer from Colorado. UCLA and Boise State were right behind it. By the start of Van Noy’s senior
year in the fall of 2008, Snelling felt as if top recruiters across the country had him on speed dial.

Oregon, in particular, was putting a lot of heat on Van Noy to commit early. It was hard to overlook the appeal of playing there. The team played a lot of games on national television. It had the coolest uniforms. And it was sure to be in the mix for the national championship. But Van Noy’s top priority for choosing a team was much more personal.

“I wanted to play for a coach who cared more about me as a person than a football player,” Van Noy said.

Eight weeks into the season BYU was 7-1, losing only to nationally ranked TCU. On October 31, Mendenhall was with his team in Fort Collins, preparing to play Colorado State the following day. That same night back in Reno, Van Noy was in his bedroom, alone. “I was sitting there thinking about all the things I had done,” Van Noy said. “I was thinking, ‘I have to get out of this. I need a way out.’ As a sixteen-year-old, I was pretty lonely.”

Unsure where to turn, he picked up his cell phone and called Mendenhall. He was at the team hotel. It was late. After saying hello, Van Noy got to the point. “Hey, I have these issues,” Van Noy told him. “I know you have standards. I don’t know if I will fulfill the standards. But I will try.”

At the same time it was recruiting Van Noy, BYU was in the hunt to land Manti Te’o, another Mormon who was the nation’s top high school linebacker. The prospect of Te’o and Van Noy playing side by side had put BYU in position to have the best linebacking corps in the country. Although Van Noy didn’t have as much fanfare as Te’o, Mendenhall had concluded he had just as much talent. Van Noy was a bit smaller—six feet three inches and 209 pounds. But in terms of raw athleticism, he was actually faster and quicker. He ran the forty in 4.5, and he started both ways. While leading his team to a state title and a perfect 14-0 record as a senior, he terrorized quarterbacks and caught thirty-five passes for 731 yards and eighteen touchdowns on offense. On defense he made seventy-nine tackles, fourteen sacks and forced six fumbles.

“With Kyle all you had to do was watch a couple series of film and you knew,” said Mendenhall. “I thought very early on that there was no limit on how good he could be.”

On January 10–11, 2009, Te’o and Van Noy both made their official
visits to BYU. Every detail had been considered to persuade Te’o to join Van Noy by committing to BYU. Even his cousin Shiloah, already a member of the team, had been assigned to be Manti’s host for the weekend. But things didn’t quite turn out as planned.

At the end of the visit Van Noy reaffirmed his commitment to BYU, pledging to sign with the Cougars on National Signing Day. “I didn’t want to go to a school where I knew I’d face challenges and temptations,” he said. “I knew I needed an environment like BYU.”

But before Te’o left Provo, he met with Mendenhall. The conversation was cordial and respectful. But BYU stopped recruiting Te’o after that weekend. Two weeks later, Te’o called Mendenhall a couple days before National Signing Day to say he was going to Notre Dame.

Later that day Mendenhall also got an unexpected call from Van Noy.

“I messed up,” Van Noy began, his voice cracking.

Mendenhall took a deep breath.

“I got arrested,” Van Noy continued.

Mendenhall felt sick.

It happened the night before. Van Noy had been out and got arrested for drunk driving. He was underage. So the case would be disposed in juvenile court. But Mendenhall had a policy that prohibited him from offering scholarships to players who weren’t living in compliance with the honor code. He didn’t make exceptions—not even for the best recruits.

“You understand you can’t come to BYU under these circumstances?” Mendenhall asked.

Van Noy was silent.

“Kyle, I love you just the same,” Mendenhall told him. “I’ll release you from your commitment to BYU.”

More silence.

“You can choose any of the schools that were recruiting you,” Mendenhall said. “My guess is that they will want you in a second.”

“But that’s not what I want,” Van Noy said.

Mendenhall didn’t expect that. “I was absolutely ready to release him at that point because of the honor code,” Mendenhall explained. “I told him I’d help him go anywhere he wanted to go. But he kept saying he wanted to come to BYU.”

Mendenhall wasn’t optimistic. But he told Van Noy to give him the rest of the day to explore options. They agreed to talk again later.

Kelly Van Noy was heartbroken. Her son’s arrest was all over the news in Reno. Juvenile arrests are supposed to remain confidential. But a reporter found out that the city’s top athlete had been charged, and the news spread fast. Friends and neighbors were talking. Plus, it looked as though all hope of her son attending BYU had been dashed.

While the Van Noys waited for Mendenhall to call back, other coaches who had seen the news of the arrest on the Internet started calling the house. “Kyle had coaches call him after the arrest and say you come here and you can play right now,” said Kelly Van Noy. “That is appealing to a seventeen-year-old kid. So is not having to face the music and not being on a campus where you feel judged and all they know about you is that you are the kid who got the DUI.”

Mendenhall went to see athletic director Tom Holmoe. They put together a scenario where BYU could still honor Van Noy’s scholarship. He’d have to agree to sit out the 2009 season and go a full year without violating the honor code. At that point, he’d have to get the endorsement of an ecclesiastical leader who could vouch that his personal life was in line with BYU’s standards. In other words, he’d have to live the honor code for a full year—whether at home or on campus—before he’d be eligible to be a student-athlete.

Holmoe was convinced Van Noy would never go for it. “That just doesn’t happen,” Holmoe said. There were too many top schools willing to overlook the DUI and play him immediately.