BYU Quarterback Bear Bachmeier 'Sees Things A Lot Better Than He Did a Year Ago'

The BYU football program is a few weeks away from wrapping up Spring Camp. BYU true sophomore quarterback Bear Bachmeier, who became the first BYU true freshman to start every game at quarterback in 2025, has been a standout throughout camp.

On Monday evening, Bachmeier led the offense on a pair of efficient drives, making throws at all three levels of the field.

The man responsible for defending Bachmeier in practice is new BYU defensive coordinator Kelly Poppinga. Poppinga believes Bachmeier's improvements from last season will help the defense get better.

"What I've noticed, what's going to make us way better is our quarterback sees things a lot better than he did a year ago," BYU defensive coordinator Kelly Poppinga said. "So, just being able to have to disguise and do some different things in the back end to be able to make sure he doesn't know exactly what we're in."

In Monday's practice, the media saw Bachmeier rifle a pass to Reggie Frischknecht for a 25-30 yard gain. The Bachmeier-Frischknecht connection put BYU in scoring position.

Bear Bachmeier hits Reggie Frischknecht in stride for a first down.

Frischknecht is a little bit of an x-factor in a BYU wide receiver room that will need new faces to step up in 2026. pic.twitter.com/OCuD8zu1Oz
— Casey Lundquist (@casey_lundquist) March 24, 2026

On the next drive, Bachmeier found Roger Saleapaga over the middle for another chunk-yardage gain.

Tight end targets have been a consistent theme throughout Spring Camp so far. That continued on Monday with Bear Bachmeier finding Roger Saleapaga for a chunk gain. pic.twitter.com/9czYDsYfjb
— Casey Lundquist (@casey_lundquist) March 24, 2026

Bachmeier's last throw of the day was a perfectly-placed touchdown to Tei Nacua. Bachmeier found Nacua on 3rd & long for the score.

Play of the day on Monday evening was a long touchdown pass from Bear Bachmeier to Tei Nacua.

Nacua bobbled it a bit but was called a touchdown. pic.twitter.com/IpS3wpQapz
— Casey Lundquist (@casey_lundquist) March 24, 2026

BYU offensive coordinator Aaron Roderick said Bachmeier has "ownership" over the offense in his second year in the program.

"He already played like a veteran player as a freshman, but just year two in our offense, you can see he just really has ownership of what we're doing," Roderick said. "He understands, you know, what all 11 guys are doing on offense and defense....He's getting the ball out of his hands really quickly and doing a nice job bringing along the other guys like, you know, Walker Lyons and Roger and some of those guys, building chemistry with those guys to teach them our offense basically."

Roderick continued, saying, "[Bear] still definitely has lots of things we're working on to improve, but what's nice is just his command of what we're doing makes it so that we can take it to the next level now... sometimes just getting us out of a bad play. It might be a 3 or 4-yard gain that nobody thinks is anything special, but he just avoided a bad play by getting us into that 3 or 4-yard gain...it's to have a guy that's smart and experienced."