BYU enters as the Big 12's preseason favorite with a Heisman dark-horse at quarterback. Cincinnati is still picking up the pieces from a four-game collapse that torched a promising season.
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FRI NOV 27 · 11:00 PM CT
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This one's a rematch of last November's 26-14 BYU win in Cincinnati, where LJ Martin ran for a career-high 222 yards and kept the Cougars' Big 12 title hopes alive while the Bearcats were mid-freefall. A year later, the roles look even more lopsided. Bear Bachmeier returns as BYU's unquestioned starter after throwing for 3,033 yards and 15 touchdowns and running for 527 more as a true freshman, and he's already being talked about as a 2026 Heisman dark-horse. Cincinnati, meanwhile, is replacing Brendan Sorsby — who left for Texas Tech — with Georgia Southern transfer JC French IV, a player one outlet slotted into a 'low' quarterback tier heading into the year.
The gap isn't just at quarterback. Martin bypassed the NFL draft to chase BYU's all-time rushing record after a Big 12 Offensive Player of the Year season, and most of the championship-game core is back around him. Cincinnati brought in over 40 new players, including running backs from Notre Dame and Stanford, but the roster overhaul reads more like a rebuild than a reload. Scott Satterfield has real hot-seat heat after Cincinnati's 4-straight losses to close 2025, capped by a Liberty Bowl blowout loss to Navy — a rough finish for a team that was ranked No. 17 at midseason.
BYU isn't just healthier at the top of the roster — it's stable at the top of the program, too. Kalani Sitake drew Penn State interest this offseason and signed a long-term extension instead, with BYU committing to facilities and assistant-salary upgrades to keep him. Big 12 coaches picked BYU as the preseason favorite to win the conference, a wide gap from where Cincinnati sits in most outlooks for 2026.
Cincinnati Bearcats
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Fully healthy — no injuries to report
BYU Cougars
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Fully healthy — no injuries to report
Cincinnati Bearcats
BYU Cougars
None of that guarantees anything by late November. BYU's coming off a 12-2 season that ended with its first-ever Big 12 Championship Game appearance and a comeback win over Georgia Tech in the Pop-Tarts Bowl — BYU's first 12-win season since 2001 — and title contenders occasionally let their foot off the gas against a rebuilding team on the road. Cincinnati has shown flashes under Satterfield even in a down year, and this Big 12 slate has already proven capable of chaos.
Still, the on-paper picture heading toward Friday, November 27 favors BYU across the board: the better quarterback, the more explosive backfield, the steadier coaching staff, and a head start in the head-to-head series.
