The Jewish Quarterback at a Mormon School

There could also be, fairly merely, no place in America much less Jewish than Brigham Younger College’s soccer stadium on Yom Kippur. In a typical 12 months, few of the roughly 63,000 followers who streamed into LaVell Edwards Stadium in Provo, Utah, for the annual homecoming recreation would even bear in mind that Saturday was the holiest day on the Jewish calendar. However that is no typical 12 months: The star quarterback for BYU, Jake Retzlaff, is Jewish. And he has led the staff for the flagship Mormon college to an undefeated begin that’s confounded prognosticators and propelled the Cougars to a top-15 nationwide rating.

It’s a type of splendidly unusual college-sports tales that serves as a magnet for digital camera crews. In current weeks, ESPN and CBS have each turned up on campus to profile Retzlaff, and Fox Sports activities dispatched a staff of 140 to broadcast its game-day studio present from Provo. The stakes for Saturday’s recreation have been excessive—a win in opposition to the College of Arizona Wildcats wouldn’t solely make the Cougars bowl-eligible, however hold the staff’s probabilities at a Huge 12 championship and national-playoff berth alive.

The stakes have been additionally excessive for me personally. As a dad step by step surrendering to stereotype in my method to center age, I had just lately launched into a mission to indoctrinate my younger youngsters within the college-sports fandom of my alma mater. I purchased them overpriced royal-blue hats and sweatshirts, and confirmed them viral movies of the beloved Cougar mascot, Cosmo, doing TikTok dances and leaping by hoops of fireplace. After deciding I might carry them to Provo final week for his or her first BYU soccer recreation, I spent days educating them the battle track. By the point we took our seats on Saturday afternoon, the propaganda had achieved its work—they couldn’t wait to belt out “Rise and shout, the Cougars are out” after every BYU landing.

I assured them they’d have many alternatives to sing, however I secretly had my doubts. Arizona’s protection was good; BYU’s first 5 wins of the season had been bizarre and a bit fluky. Most vital, like several BYU fan, I harbored a vaguely superstitious notion that this was the purpose of the season—with nationwide hype peaking and other people lastly taking discover—that our staff normally melts down. Chatting with followers earlier than the sport, I found I wasn’t alone on this anxiousness. One fan even puzzled aloud if Retzlaff’s determination to play on Yom Kippur, which many spiritual Jews spend in prayer and fasting, would curse his efficiency. He was joking, I believed. However then the Cougars’ opening drive ended with Retzlaff lacking an open receiver ultimately zone on fourth down, and the Wildcats marched down the sector to attain, and all of a sudden the specter of divine punishment didn’t appear fairly so far-fetched. I discovered myself questioning if another nervous BYU followers have been Googling How unhealthy is it to play soccer on the day of atonement?

Once I met Retzlaff on campus a few days later, I instructed him concerning the earnest Mormon’s concern over his compliance with Jewish regulation, and he laughed. “That’s fandom,” he instructed me. Retzlaff, who wore sweats and a Star of David necklace, mentioned he by no means significantly thought-about skipping the sport. He knew some Jews would disagree—Sandy Koufax famously sat out the primary recreation of the World Sequence in 1965 to watch Yom Kippur. However to Retzlaff, taking part in on Saturday was an opportunity to signify his religion on a stage that isn’t precisely teeming with individuals like him. Utah has one of many smallest Jewish populations in America, and at BYU, there are solely two different Jewish college students. That places Retzlaff in an odd place: He represents one of many college’s smallest minorities and can be one in every of its most well-known college students.

Retzlaff, a California native who spent two years as a high junior-college quarterback, instructed me that his first thought when BYU recruiters confirmed up was about soccer, not religion. The college has a relatively high-profile program with a powerhouse pedigree—the Cougars gained the nationwide championship in 1984 and have churned out a string of well-known quarterbacks over time, together with Steve Younger and Jim McMahon. However he admits that considering what his non-football life would appear like on a 99 p.c Mormon campus gave him pause.

BYU, which strictly prohibits ingesting, premarital intercourse, and a bunch of different conventional faculty pastimes, will not be an apparent draw for many non-Mormon college students. However yearly, the varsity attracts a mix of faculty athletes who need to play their sport with out distraction and college students from different orthodox-religious backgrounds who don’t thoughts spending time on America’s most “stone-cold sober” campus. (Final 12 months, a Muslim basketball participant for BYU named Aly Khalifa made headlines for fasting throughout a March Insanity recreation that fell throughout Ramadan.)

Retzlaff instructed me his arrival in Provo was a tradition shock. Sundays have been brutal: Native companies closed, the campus shut down, and, with most of his teammates at church, Retzlaff discovered himself sitting alone in his room, struggling to chase away boredom. The obligatory spiritual lessons, which steadily started with all the scholars singing a Mormon hymn, may be disorienting. “Each single individual round me has acquired this factor memorized,” he recalled, “and I do not know what’s occurring.”

One other participant in his place may need chosen to downplay his spiritual variations; Retzlaff determined to lean in. On Instagram, he began referring to himself because the “BYJew,” and inspired skittish buddies and teammates to make use of the time period as nicely. (Ultimately, the Utah County Chabad started promoting “BYJew” T-shirts.) To rejoice Sukkot final 12 months, he organized for a kosher meals truck from Salt Lake Metropolis to go to campus so he may deal with his teammates to shawarma and falafel. He relished the chance to coach. “Members of the LDS religion do have a humorous fascination with Judaism,” he instructed me. A number of the questions he acquired—“Do you guys imagine in Jesus?” for instance—have been rudimentary. (“To me, that’s like, you’ve by no means met a Jew in your life,” he instructed me.) However others have been extra refined, prompting conversations concerning the overlapping theologies and shared cultural experiences of two spiritual minorities, one very outdated, the opposite comparatively new.

The Latter-day Saint rituals weren’t his personal, however Retzlaff discovered to seek out consolation and even a type of divine magnificence in them. In the course of the pregame staff prayers, when all the opposite gamers bow their heads, he seems to be up and across the locker room at his buddies and teammates—attempting “to be current within the second” as he displays on his personal gratitude.

Retzlaff’s expertise took on a brand new dimension after the October 7 assaults on Israel final 12 months. As campuses throughout America erupted in protests over the battle in Gaza, and as lots of these protests curdled into virulent anti-Semitism, Retzlaff was struck by how totally different his classmates appeared from the individuals in viral video clips hurling epithets at Jewish college students. He suspected that the secularism that dominated these different campuses performed a component. “I’d like to ask them about their religion,” Retzlaff instructed me of the protesters. “What are the chances that they’re trustworthy in any respect? I’d wager you they’re not.” For all of the inconvenience and occasional awkwardness that BYU’s deep spiritual tradition would possibly trigger him, Retzlaff believes it’s allowed his fellow college students to see his Judaism not as a marker of political id however as a religion that warrants respect, even reverence.

In reality, Retzlaff instructed me, as BYU’s quarterback he’s encountered extra anti-Mormonism than anti-Semitism. The 12 months earlier than he joined the staff, some followers on the College of Oregon greeted the Cougars with chants of “Fuck the Mormons.” The college finally apologized, however Retzlaff instructed me he and his teammates have continued to face spiritual taunts in opposing stadiums. He’s much less scandalized by the heckling than by the dearth of concern it appears to engender. “The blatant disrespect for his or her religion—it’s one thing to consider. What if there was a Jewish college that had a Jewish soccer staff, and so they have been saying that within the stands?” Retzlaff requested me. “Like, think about if that hit the papers. That will be a huge deal.” The informal bigotry, and muted response to it, unnerves him. “There’s lots of people who simply don’t like Mormon individuals, for no motive,” he instructed me. “That’s what occurred to the Jews all all through historical past.”

Within the enviornment on Saturday, Retzlaff and his staff discovered their rhythm within the second quarter. After an ideal 20-yard landing move tied the sport, the Cougars by no means seemed again. They scored 24 unanswered factors, and compelled 4 turnovers. We sang the battle track till our voices went hoarse, and by the point the sport led to a 41–19 blowout, my youngsters have been transformed. I had a Jewish quarterback to thank for serving to me move my fandom right down to the following era.

However BYU’s win wasn’t significant solely to the Latter-day Saints who have been watching that day. After the sport ended, Retzlaff made his method to the locker room to bathe and alter, after which took questions at a press convention. Taking part in like that on Yom Kippur was, he would later inform me, a “non secular expertise.” He was exhausted and emotional. However earlier than he may depart, he acquired phrase that somebody was ready for him within the stadium, now principally empty. A Jewish fan had waited greater than an hour to take an image with the quarterback. After shaking Retzlaff’s hand and thanking him, the person mentioned he was going house to interrupt his quick.