That statistic is interesting. This tends to imply that folks have emigrated from other parts of the US.
From an outsider’s view, Utah still appears as a right wing, pro-corporate city-state.
Has the influx of non-LDS peoples to Salt Lake been primarily a conservative one, those attracted to the climate that mormonism fostered?
Or, is my view of the Utah political climate clouded?
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Salt Lake County from 6200 South to the Capital from the east to the west votes democrat as well as Park City and the area surrounding Park City. The rest of the State with the exception of a few areas near Ogden are Republican and many of those areas are Trumpists. I distinguish traditional Republicans from Trumpists because I view them as totally different. I have been an independent voter my entire life. I registered as a Republican prior to the 2016 election because the only election that typically counts in most of Utah is the Republican primary.
I would say that with the number of people who are not LDS and the number who no longer identify as LDS, Salt Lake is 30%. There are more LDS Wards being dissolved in Salt Lake City than being created. I would guess that the overall State population is probably still slightly higher than 50% LDS. However, many who no longer identify as LDS hold conservative political beliefs, although that trend is changing among younger LDS members and former members.
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I was shocked that the little voting district encompassing the byu campus voted for Biden over trump in 2020.
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That is quite amazing.
A moral liahona is more important than political party for the younger BYU lot.
I like it.
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Maybe this comment should be moved to the religion category, but this seems about right. This is our third SLC area neighborhood and each one has been about a third members, and of those members about a third that attend regularly. My moms sugarhouse neighborhood seems about a third as well. Growing up we had 18 houses on the block. Of those, 3 were not LDS. Of the 15 remaining, a little over half were regulars. Today, it seems to be opposite. 4 or 5 LDS and 2 are regulars. The three wards in the sugarhouse building I grew up in has been consolidated to one smaller ward.
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This is the part I can’t seem to get out of my head.
It’s not hard to list some of the challenges Utah might have bringing in recruits, but I’m still not buying it. Why are we getting out recruited by USU, Wazzu, Nevada, Colo State, and many other regional schools. Any challenge that applies to Utah you could double down on and then apply to BYU and that’s before the Honor Code and they’re still on way more solid ground than we are right now.
Yes, we’re going to struggle compared to UCLA, Arizona, and not be attractive to most talent on the eastern seaboard. But we’re not dog meat. We’re not a team who should have 8-year droughts from even making the NCAA tournament. Whatever the floor of our program should be, we’ve crashed through that and are well into sub-basement level at this point.
I see our challenges, but we’re making mole hills look like mountains here. We’re still a P5 school with great basketball facilities, a great university, in a great city, with great history — and believe it or not — great fans who are understandably put off and apathetic at this point. There are 350 D1 basketball programs. Why does it feel like half of them are making a better pitch than us when really only 25 or so actually have more to offer?
I remember watching us play UVU a few years ago when they had Madsen as coach and some 7-foot foreign guy playing center and thinking, how are they getting guys at UVU that we could use at Utah?
One thing that has plagued Utah is that they never reeled in a healthy millenial fan base. Who are BYU’s millenial fans? Kids who watched Jimmer tear things up while we were onto our third coach after Majerus. Utah mbb lost its fan base after the Gen X’ers. That’s a problem.
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What has bugged me is that Larry K couldn’t sustain what was a pretty good two- or three-year mini-run. Those teams from 2014 to 2016 were really good. Heck, there were three first-round NBA picks on the floor along with some very solid players in Loveridge, Taylor, and Tucker. Utah was a top-three conference team and a top-25 team overall. What happened? Sad that those teams didn’t lead to better recruiting and development.
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Utes used to get some really good players from California. I can’t think of any one from there since early in Larry K years. Andy Hill on LK staff was really good recruiting in Europe—no one current staff has those contacts.
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A couple of things happened, IMO.
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LK swung for the fences in recruiting once he got things rolling. But he wasn’t as good at contingency plans when the prospect would go somewhere else.
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I think we had 1 or 2 tourney-worthy teams between 2016 and his departure, but he underscheduled and we self eliminated from the Tourney field.
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Add to this discussion…
Seeing guys like Pelle Larsson and Caleb Lohner contributing for other teams makes me cringe.
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We missed on Larson but Lohner can kiss my big white butt.
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A part of the problem, and I guess we’ll never know how big, is that we have run very clean programs for years. We can’t say that about Arizona, for example. I’m always amazed when I visit Tucson, and I think about blue chip players being attracted to that town.
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They don’t call it Tuscum for nothing.
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13 years in the PAC12 Utah"s overall in conference record is a sub .500 112-125
2012 3-15
2013 5-13
2014 9-9
2015 13-5
2016 13-5
2017 11-7
2018 11-7
2019 11-7
2020 7-11
2021 8-11
2022 4-16
2023 10-10
2024 7-9
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Imagine our ‘welcome to the Big 12’ next season.
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With the new reality, it’s hard for me to tell how much recruiting depends on the coach and how much depends on NIL.
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Especially if that recent court decision holds up. It’s only a trial court decision, and it’s just a temporary restraining order, but if it’s upheld schools will be able to go straight to recruits, offering NIL money. Yes, That’s insane. It might still become the law. I’m skeptical.
My fear is that someone will come after Devion Smith with some $$$. I hope he stays, but he’s been known to jump around a bit
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We have to think that way about every good player now.
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About last night’s developments involving our in-state rivals.
The Aggies are in a crappy conference. Kansas is down. It’s now lost six conference games this year.
That being said, we’ve always known Pope is a really good coach. Right? I did. Still he’s had as many struggles as Craig Smith. But he’s been a head coach at BYU a lot longer than Smith. I don’t see Pope’s recruiting setting the world on fire.
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