Former BYU AD stunned by Harlan's postgame incident – Deseret News

When University of Utah athletic director Mark Harlan berated the officials and the Big 12 after the Utes' 22-21 loss to BYU on Saturday, Val Hale couldn't believe what he saw.

“You know the big big eyes emoji?” Hale told the Y's Guys podcast this week. “I think every athletic director in the country had that exact look on their face when they saw that, because things like that just don’t happen. It goes against everything athletic directors stand for.”

Harlan, overwhelmed by a defensive call against the Utes on BYU's final possession, marched into the press room and declared, “I've been the athletic director for 12 years. This game was absolutely stolen from us. We won this game. Someone else stole it from us!”

Hale was BYU's athletic director from 1999 to 2004 and before that worked for years at the Provo campus in marketing, fundraising and media relations.

“It surprised me for three reasons to actually go in front of the press unannounced and make a statement like that,” Hale said. “First of all, it surprised me that he did it. Second, it surprised me since its president (Taylor Randall) had just launched the Rival Right campaign. And three, I was surprised that he attacked the Big 12.”

In addition to condemning the officials, Harlan directed his ire at the conference that saved Utah from fading into obscurity after the Pac-12 collapsed.

“We were excited to be in the Big 12, but tonight I’m not,” Harlan said. “I’ll talk to the (Big 12) commissioner. That wasn’t fair to our team.”

Utah joined Colorado, Arizona and Arizona State as new members of the Big 12 before the season.

“It's one thing to complain about the officials, but when I got involved in the Big 12, I thought, 'Are you kidding me?' “This is your first year?” Hale said. “It really surprised me. I didn’t see that coming.”

The Big 12 responded by fining Harlan $40,000 and publicly reprimanding him. Harlan issued a statement accepting the punishment but offering little else.

“It wasn’t an apology, I think,” Hale said. “It was the most inexplicable thing I've ever seen. He tried to compliment BYU and everything, but he wasn't the least bit apologetic in that statement. I'm waiting for Taylor Randall to take the stand. Because he was so public in his Rival Right campaign, I can't imagine they would just take it like that.”

Hale can empathize with Harlan to a certain extent. Under his leadership, BYU endured three losing seasons. In his new book, “Out of the Blue,” Hale described the job of an athletic director as a great job when the team is winning and a bad job when the team is losing.

Utah is 1-5 in the Big 12 and in 15th place.

“Now put yourself in his shoes. Utah is expected to win. “You go into the season thinking you're going to make the playoffs, and now all of a sudden he's lost his fifth game in a row,” Hale said. “He must be under enormous pressure. He can't go anywhere without people grabbing him and saying, “Hey, what's going on and I have the solution and I need you to do this or that.” It probably just built up and eventually boiled over. The pressure is enormous.”

Not only were Harlan's antics on Saturday painful, they were recorded and are sure to resurface for years to come. His rivalry moment in front of the cameras “will live on in infamy,” Hale said.

Dave McCann is a sportswriter and columnist for the Deseret News and a play-by-play announcer and show host for BYUtv/ESPN+. He co-hosts “Y’s Guys” on ysguys.com and is the author of the children's book “C is for Cougar”, available at desertbook.com.