As No. 11 BYU fought to erase a second-half deficit against TCU, head coach Kevin Young was battling a different concern: whether his star freshman could physically make it through the night. No. 11 BYU stormed back from nine points down to beat TCU and improve to 16–1 on the season. The hero of the night was, once again, AJ Dybantsa, who was battling illness and had his coach worried, yet still delivered.

“Thought AJ was going to die out there, and they just found a way to make plays. He’s obviously a great player. We needed him, and he stepped up,” Kevin Young said in the postgame conference. “Even on an off night, the guy still looks like an all-world, generational-type player, even when he’s sick. Threw me off with the long sleeves, I’ll be honest. That threw me off. I was like, ‘Oh boy.’ I don’t like when guys do random stuff like that. I’m very routine-driven, so I was like, ‘What’s happening right now with the sleeves?’”

He continued, “But he’s a tough-minded kid. He didn’t say a whole lot to anyone about not feeling great, and he just got into that mode that great players are able to get into.”

About 45 minutes before tipoff vs. TCU, BYUtv reported that freshman star AJ Dybantsa was battling an undisclosed illness but would still start. He opened the game wearing a long-sleeve undershirt — something that caught his coach off guard — but removed it a few minutes later.

The illness showed early. Dybantsa managed just eight points on 2-of-8 shooting in the first half, struggling to generate lift or rhythm as BYU’s offense stalled. The problem wasn’t just him, though. BYU shot 32% from the field, went 1-for-11 from deep, and went into the break down 36–30. The second half began with TCU stretching its lead to nine points, and it looked like the game was tilting toward a Horned Frogs win.

Then the game flipped.

He poured in 17 points on 6-of-14 shooting in the first eight minutes of the second half, shifting the momentum and dragging BYU back into contention. He finished with 25 points on 8-of-22 shooting and six rebounds. The efficiency dipped, which made sense considering he was sick, but his impact was undeniable. Despite the inefficiency, his second-half surge was the difference in BYU’s 76–70 win.

But things aren’t getting any easier for BYU from here.

BYU Faces Difficult Stretch Ahead

The depth of BYU showed up against TCU on Wednesday night. Dybantsa went the final 12 minutes without scoring and struggled in the first half as well, but the other two pieces of BYU’s Big Three, Richie Saunders and Rob Wright III, stepped up big time.

Saunders finished the night with 8 points on 4-of-12 shooting and hit a huge three with 2:14 remaining to seal it, while Rob Wright added 15 points, 6 rebounds, and 6 assists. Those three will need to be even better if BYU hopes to get through the upcoming stretch without a scratch.

Three of BYU’s next four games are against No. 15 Texas Tech, No. 1 Arizona, and preseason No. 19 Kansas. ESPN’s projections have them favored in just one of the three games — Texas Tech — and even that sits at a thin 50.7%. Their best chance to get through it without damage is for AJ Dybantsa to recover fast and keep pushing them over the line. That’s how you prove you’re a superstar.

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