Asked whether he'd give up a couple of those touchdown passes against UCLA, if it meant he could maintain some sort of normalcy and reasonable expectations, Max Hall gave the kind of natural laugh he doesn't show so much to the media anymore.

"Absolutely not," Hall said. "It was an awesome game ... something I'll remember forever."

And it's seemed that the Cougars, by way of their on-field leader, have yet to recover.

Hall again won big against Wyoming on Sept. 20 but showed the type of flaws that were more reasonable to expect a year ago. He missed some reads, he threw into bad coverage situations.

Those flaws accentuated themselves against Utah State last week.

Now, they have to be put to rest against New Mexico on Saturday.

"We kind of caught ourselves in a funk there for a little bit," Hall said.

It's seemed the biggest issue for the Cougars right now -- not just Hall -- is they had stopped enjoying the journey for a little bit.

Blowouts were far too much expected, rather than appreciated. Smiles, unlike wins, were few and far between.

That feeling was confirmed by players, who say the topic at the team meeting Wednesday was about trying to loosen up a little bit after winning 15 consecutive games. Smell the roses without fretting about the Rose Bowl, or any other BCS game.

A group that was often free-spirited with their time and quick-witted with their words a month ago had gone closer to reclusive as this season's expectations continued to grow with the win totals. It's impossible to talk with media, apparently, and fans and others are constantly bringing up topics that were doing more harm than good.

"We kind of lost the point of it all the past couple of weeks," senior linebacker David Nixon said. "We were taking everything a little too seriously. Especially when you're uptight in this game, that's when you're going to screw up more. I think that's what happened to us at Utah State."

Brandon Bradley, a defensive back who's appreciative to be healthy, was the leader of the session in which players shared stories of why they played the game.

The best one had to come from backup quarterback Stephen Covey, who told an anecdote of a former high school teammate who tried to play with a concussion.

Really, it came off as a good bit. The teammate was glassy eyed and former Timpview and current Cougar teammate Luke Ashworth said when the play was brought to the huddle, it was forgotten and remembered and forgotten again.

Anyway, the kid wound up with an 80-yard touchdown -- "most amazing run I've ever seen," Covey told his teammates.

The punch line: The Timpview teammate runs to the sideline, gets congratulated by several teammates and coaches ... then asks what down it is.

Boy, did BYU need that.

"I think there was a little extra bounce in everyone's step at practice," said senior receiver Mike Reed, who has his own reason to be elated -- returning to the field after missing the past two games with an injury.

They were becoming robots. It was easy to see.

The Utah State game bore interesting results and comments. The looks in players' eyes was that they didn't enjoy it one bit. There's probably some anger there about giving up the last two scores, and having hopeless Aggie fans actually have the nerve to chant "Overrated." (By the way, is that a bigger insult to USU or BYU?)

Whatever the case, the Cougars left Logan with dull eyes and an attitude that was way too business-like.

And they spoke about their lack of focus, and how the end of the game became so chaotic.

Geez, fellas, you had a 20-point lead in the closing minutes. If you can't handle the stress, get into sportswriting, would ya?

True, it's not going to be all fun and games. Injuries are going to happen. Drives are going to stall. Real reasons to frown will occur. This team might actually get a legit challenge one of these days on this "Quest for Perfection." (Yeah, that slogan doesn't put any pressure on folks ...)

Just yesterday, Mendenhall announced that two reserves -- defensive back G Pittman and defensive lineman Mosese Foketi -- are being held out of practice until some academic work is cleared up.

Those guys have reason to sulk.

"We weren't getting cocky about the ranking and everything," tight end Andrew George said. "It was more like it was weighing us down."

Think about it: If BYU can't be happy, how must its opponents feel?

• Jason Franchuk can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it