Malzahn, Holgorsen back in Power 5 as part of Big 12’s 4 brand-new groups

Gus Malzahn is back in a Power 5 conference, with UCF prepping for its veryfirst season in the Big 12, where Houston coach Dana Holgorsen is onceagain supervising a group’s shift into the league like he did simply more than a years ago at West Virginia.

While BYU is providing up its football self-reliance, coach Kalani Sitake has experience with a program moving up to the greatest level. And Scott Satterfield’s initially season with Cincinnati — and the Bearcats’ launching in the Big 12 — comes after 4 seasons in the ACC as Louisville’s coach.

They are the 4 brand-new coaches, for the 4 brand-new groups, in the broadened Big 12.

“It’s simply the enjoyment of playing some of the finest groups in college football week in and week out and that grind that goes with it,” previous Auburn coach Malzahn stated Thursday, as the Big 12 covered up its football media days. “That’s what thrills me. Just the profile of our program taking that next action.”

Malzahn is going into his 3rd season at UCF, which followed his 8 successive winning seasons in the SEC. The Tigers made it to the BCS champion videogame in his 2013 launching season, the year priorto the start of the four-team College Football Playoff.

UCF proclaimed itself nationwide champ after going unbeaten in 2017 and whipping Malzahn’s Auburn team in the Peach Bowl, while one-loss Alabama won the CFP title videogame. The Knights, who left the American Athletic Conference with Cincinnati and Houston, haveactually gone 18-9 general under Malzahn with a 2-3 record versus Power 5 groups.

The Big 12 media days were at AT&T Stadium, the house of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys and its conference champion videogame. It is likewise where 2 seasons ago Cincinnati lost to Alabama in the Cotton Bowl after endingupbeing the veryfirst Group of 5 group to make the four-team CFP.

“I do believe all 4 schools will be competitive in this league,” Satterfield stated. “The thing that as a newbie into the league, you wear’t understand the makeup of the groups. We sanctuary’t played in this league. We sanctuary’t played the groups that are in this league, so you puton’t truly comprehend the ins and outs of the groups that we’re getting prepared to play.”

With the 4 additions coming a year priorto Oklahoma and Texas leave for the SEC, the Big 12 will have 14 groups this season. The conference now spreadsout over 3 time zones with schools from 8 various states, extending from Utah to West Virginia to Florida.

This is the veryfirst modification in the league’s makeup because 2012, when West Virginia and TCU were included to then keep the Big 12 at 10 groups.

“Well, it’s amazing to be the brand-new man onceagain,” stated Holgorsen, who was with WVU for its veryfirst 7 Big 12 seasons priorto going to Houston. “The last 4 years haveactually been a little various for me, being in the American conference, and it truly makes you value a conference like the Big 12 by now being back. This thing goes so numerous various instructions. The University of Houston hasactually been looking forward to this day for a long, long time.”

Houston wasn’t part of the initial 12-team Big 12 lineup when the league started play in 1996 after the members of the previous Big Eight Conference signedupwith with half of the defunct Southwest Conference. The Cougars went from the SWC to Conference USA and then the American in 2013.

Sitake, a previous BYU fullback going into his 8th season as head coach of his alma mater, was on Kyle Whittingham’s personnel at Utah when the Utes went from the Mountain West to the Pac-12. Utah has had just one losing season because, and is coming off successive 10-win seasons that ended in the Rose Bowl.

“This is a lot of enjoyable,” Sitake stated. “Being an independent, I wasn’t able to experience this as a head coach. This hasactually been a fantastic dream for me, so please wear’t wake me up.”

The Cougars were nationwide champs under coach LaVell Edwards after going unbeaten in1984 They were in the WAC then, moved to the Mountain West in 1999 and endedupbeing an FBS independent in 2011.

“This isn’t going to be simple, and we understand that,” Sitake stated. “Now that we’re here, there’s a high sense of seriousness for us to get allset to go, and I feel truly great about the development that we’ve made as a group in the last couple [of] years, and there’s some truly cool lessons that we’ve been able to findout about our abilities however likewise the shortages that we mostlikely have conference some of those Power 5 groups that we’ve played in the past 5 years.”

Reporting by The Associated Press.