Thirty-two years ago Brigham Young University had scant interest in a skinny Oahu Prep Bowl-winning quarterback from Radford High School.
But Monday the doors were held wide open in Provo, Utah, and the welcome was effusive when Ken Niumatalolo came to visit.
His arrival at Salt Lake City Airport late Sunday in a Navy jacket drew applause from the faithful and the Cougars are courting Annapolis’ current — for the moment, at least — head football coach with full-court-press urgency.
Two days after leading the Midshipmen to a record 14th consecutive victory over Army (eight under his watch), speculation along the snowy Wasatch Front is that the job is Niumatalolo’s, if the one-time University of Hawaii backup quarterback wants it.
It is an intriguing drama that was hardly envisioned even a month ago. Right up until the time that Bronco Mendenhall, BYU’s head coach of 11 years, bolted from the blue for Virginia, the 50-year-old Niumatalolo was expected to be a lifer in Annapolis, where he had a $1.6 million salary and a contract to take him to at least age 55.
Earlier this year he had joked, “when I retire (from Navy) maybe I’ll see if the Radford job is open.”
The attraction for Niumatalolo is that he is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) and one of his sons, Va’a, is a sophomore linebacker for the Cougars. Another, Ali’i, a highly recruited linebacker, is scheduled to go on a church mission after he graduates in June.
Ken served one mission for the LDS church, to California in the mid-1980s, and now its flagship school has another in mind: leading the independent Cougars to the promised land of a much-coveted but so-far elusive Power Five conference affiliation.
Being passed over by the Pac-12, which added rival Utah, and ignored by the Big 12, has left the Cougars wanting — wanting more relevance, a better path to a national championship and postseason rewards beyond six trips to the Las Vegas Bowl in 11 years, all things that frustrated Mendenhall.
BYU has required its head football coaches to be church members in good standing, severely limiting the depth of a seasoned candidate pool.
But Niumatalolo, who is 67-37 as Navy’s winningest all-time football coach and the first Division I head coach of Polynesian (Samoan) ancestry, is a demonstrated winner and coach of character.
Enough of the latter that, even though he incurred the wrath of his boss, Navy athletic director Chet Gladchuk, Niumatalolo felt compelled to tell his players 48 hours before the Army-Navy game of his intention to visit BYU.
“The only thing that is really disturbing, to all of us, is the fact that it’s been played out through the course of the week,” Gladchuk told the Associated Press before Saturday’s game. “It’s been a distraction. This is the biggest game of the year. We’re an institution, and we’re certainly a football program that’s steeped in team and not about ‘me.’ All of a sudden, it’s become about that.”
Wary of leaks, Niumatalolo correctly favored an up-front approach, saying, “I didn’t want to be one of those guys that says, ‘Read my lips. I’m not going anywhere,’ and next thing you know, you see them on the plane somewhere.”
Playing sparingly in the shadow of Warren Jones and Garrett Gabriel at quarterback for UH, Niumatalolo nevertheless acquired a thorough enough grasp of Paul Johnson’s spread offense to earn a graduate assistant job and then full-time assistant position with the Rainbow Warriors before moving on to Nevada-Las Vegas and rejoining Johnson at Navy.
Niumatalolo, who was credited with giving UH a toe hold on North Shore recruiting, liked to say a highlight of his career with the ’Bows was walking into church the mornings after 56-14 and 59-28 victories over the Cougars in 1989 and ’90.
As soon as today, the Cougars could find themselves embracing Niumatalolo.
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.
