Never when I was young did I think I’d be a Ute. I grew up a fan of the school about 40 miles south of Salt Lake City in Provo, Utah, called BYU.

That is, until I returned home from my LDS Church mission in Lima, Peru. After that, I began attending the University of Utah.

That’s when the conversion process began. For two years of my life, I was trying to help people become converted to my religion. Now the conversion process was happening to me. My religion was changing from “Cougar Blue” to “Ute Crimson.”

In my time covering U sports, I was very impressed overall with the type of athletes the U has, as well as their administration and coaching staffs. They’re great.

The university has to go through a lot to get student athletes to come here. It is much easier for BYU to recruit to the state than for the U.

A person inside the state who is being recruited by the U is probably being recruited by BYU as well. If he or she is LDS, they often feel a certain “influence” to attend BYU. That influence often comes from other people. If they decide to go to the U, they might receive criticism.

There was a U soccer player who had many prominent neighbors who were BYU fans. She said when she decided to come to the U, many people stopped talking to her back home.

On the other hand, athletes whom the U might recruit outside the state of Utah are often scared to come to Utah, for fear of being converted by a prominent local religion.

Take for instance what happened with the Utah Jazz and Dallas Mavericks. The Jazz instigated a trade to Dallas for Derek Harper. Everything was set and the deal was a go. That is, until Harper utterly refused to come to Utah, telling reporters: “You go live in Utah. I don’t want to live in Utah.”

So the U has to deal with a lot in recruiting. But it still manages to obtain good athletes.

But not only are the athletes good players, they are also decent people.

I’m not saying that other universities don’t have athletes that are respectful, but the U has a plethora of them.

There is a prominent player on the football team named Jason Kaufusi.

When the April Fool’s edition of The Chronicle was about to come out and all the reporters were getting their stories ready, I decided to write Kaufusi an e-mail to see if he would have an objection of being the butt-end of an April Fool’s joke. I did that because he is my friend and I didn’t want to make him upset.

He responded by telling me it would be fine and he would be ready to take any criticism from the article, knowing he would be laughed at.

The article was completely false and it’s obvious Kaufusi is not a ballerina, but it showed me what type of person he was and that personified the type of athletes the U has.

Softball coach Mona Stevens is another prime example of a coach who has respect for others. She has constantly promptly returned phone calls and has not been afraid of the press.

Not everyone at the U is respectful. Not everyone is kind. There are some athletes, coaches and administrators who have been rude. But on the whole, U athletics are unmatched by anyone.

So my conversion is complete. Go Utes!

Lance welcomes feedback at: [email protected].