For the second consecutive football season, BYU has been subjected to profane, derogatory chants ridiculing the school’s connection to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Colorado State has now issued an apology after a chorus of ‘f*** the Mormons’ rang out from Canvas Stadium in Fort Collins, Colorado during the Cougars’ 41-23 win on Saturday.
‘Colorado State apologizes to BYU, its student-athletes and fans, and to members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for the chant directed at them during Saturday’s game,’ read the CSU statement. ‘Mocking anyone’s faith has no place at CSU. It runs counter to our community’s values and to who we are. BYU’s players, coaches and fans deserved better. We are addressing this with our students.’
The Daily Mail has also sought comment from the Big 12, as well as the newly reformed Pac-12, which includes CSU as one of its member schools. A BYU spokesperson shared a statement about the issue that the school released last year (see below).
BYU head coach Kalani Sitake took the high road when speaking to reporters on Saturday by stressing his belief that only a small group of fans were involved in the chants.
‘I think the chants [are] mostly a minority of people and fans,’ he said. ‘There’s some amazing fans here in Fort Collins, so I’m not too worried about that.
BYU improved to 3-0 on the season with Saturday’s win over Colorado State in Fort Collins
Colorado State football fans are accused of chanting ‘f*** the Mormons’ during the game
Head coach Jim Mora of the Colorado State Rams and Head coach Kalani Sitake of the BYU Cougars shake hands after the game. Sitake insists only a small group of fans were guilty
‘The guys are motivated to play football, no matter what. We’re not going to judge an entire fan base on a few … of the ones that made their chants.’
It was a much different scene in Fort Collins before the game, when students from both schools took part in a book drive for the city’s Children’s Speech & Reading Center. In total, the two groups of students donated 3,000 books, which set a new single-event record for BYU’s Cougs Care initiative, according to organizers.
Unfortunately, Saturday night’s incident was hardly the first. A year ago, it was students at the University of Colorado who directed a similar chant at BYU during a game in Boulder.
BYU is the most prominent Mormon school in the world and is directly owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
After that 2025 game, Colorado coach Deion Sanders issued an apology to the school, but also pleaded, ‘Don’t indict us just based on a group of young kids that probably was intoxicated and high simultaneously… BYU, we love you. We appreciate you, and we support you.’
The university released their own statement condemning the language used, saying ‘Such behavior is deeply disappointing and does not reflect the values of respect, inclusion and integrity we expect of our campus community.’
Despite the apology and the pleas, the Big 12 Conference still fined the school $50,000.
‘Hateful and discriminatory language has no home in the Big 12 Conference,’ conference commissioner Brett Yormark said in a 2025 statement.
‘While we appreciate Colorado apologizing for the chants that occurred in the stands during Saturday’s game, the Big 12 maintains zero tolerance for such behavior.’
Many BYU fans traveled to Fort Collins on Saturday to see the heavily favored Cougars win
The chants from fans also drew scorn from Utah’s Republican Senator Mike Lee (a Mormon and a BYU graduate) who posted on his personal X account, ‘I’m not sure why, but ‘F the Mormons’ chants have become far too common at BYU’s away games.
‘Funny thing – the host schools generally don’t seem to be the least bit concerned about it, even though all of them have many Latter-day Saints enrolled as students.
‘And in the case of last night’s game at the University of Colorado, it was so much more – meaning much worse – than a chant. It was hours upon hours of religious slurs and bigotry.’
BYU’s basketball team faced similar chants during a game against Providence College in 2024.
