Watching BYU upset No. 1 Miami in 1990 was a dream come true for Nathan Anderson, a lifelong Cougars fan from Salt Lake County who was still settling into his freshman year on the Provo campus.
“It was pandemonium. To see that game and witness what took place was unreal,” Anderson told the “Y’s Guys” podcast recently. “I’ll never forget seeing Ty Detmer take a couple steps back and have two tackles for Miami run into each other. It was a lot of fun. We stormed the field!”
Rushing across Cougar Stadium with his roommates, and thousands of other revelers, was a far cry from months earlier when Anderson fastened on his chinstrap for the last time.
Basketball was his favorite sport at Jordan High, but at the coaxing of his friends, the 6-foot-2, 190-pound tight end decided to play football his senior year. The Beetdiggers marched into the state playoffs against Bountiful and that’s where the game, and nearly his life, came to an end…