Cade Uluave made the 15-player semifinal field for the Butkus Award this week. His case is not hard to find. It sits in the middle of BYU’s defense, where 31 tackles over the last four games turned a quiet September into a national award file.
Uluave leads BYU with 45 tackles through seven games. The next Cougar has 34. He has made nine tackles against Notre Dame and 10 at UCF in consecutive weeks, the two highest totals of his BYU season.
The award news deserves more than a congratulatory sentence, but it also needs the right weight. Uluave is a semifinalist, not a finalist. The Butkus Foundation will cut the field again on Nov. 20, and its selection committee considers more than a tackle total. The foundation lists instincts, toughness, leadership, competitiveness, football character and consistent excellence among its standards.
That creates a useful question for the final month: what does Uluave still have to show?
The short answer is that he has already proved he can clean up a defense and handle difficult traffic. He now needs to turn more of those tackles into lost downs while helping BYU recover from its worst defensive game of the season.
The tackle line changed after three games
Uluave’s first three BYU games produced 14 tackles. He had three against Utah Tech, six against Arizona and five at Colorado State. The Arizona game included his interception, but the weekly tackle volume had not yet separated him from the rest of the defense.
Then the middle of BYU’s schedule arrived.
| Opponent | Total tackles | Solo | Tackles for loss | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Utah Tech | 3 | 3 | 2.0 | W 63-7 |
| Arizona | 6 | 4 | 0.0 | W 28-17 |
| Colorado State | 5 | 3 | 0.0 | W 41-23 |
| TCU | 6 | 5 | 0.0 | W 17-10 |
| Iowa State | 6 | 1 | 0.5 | W 24-10 |
| Notre Dame | 9 | 6 | 1.0 | W 28-24 |
| UCF | 10 | 6 | 0.0 | L 39-31 |
Uluave has made 68.9% of his season tackles in the last four games. The last two alone account for 19, or 42.2% of his total. His season average is 6.43 per game, but that number hides the direction of the work.
This is not a case built on one 15-tackle afternoon against an offense that ran 90 plays. Uluave has climbed from six to six to nine to 10 as the schedule tightened. He led BYU in the win over then-No. 2 Notre Dame and received the Big 12’s defensive player of the week award. One week later, he reached double digits while UCF ran 83 plays.
The loss at UCF matters here. Ten tackles can mean a linebacker dominated. They can also mean the offense kept reaching him. Uluave’s total came during an afternoon when BYU allowed 463 yards, 26 first downs and 39 points.
That does not erase his production. It changes how we should read it.
He has become BYU’s floor, not its havoc leader
Uluave’s 45 tackles sit 11 clear of the next Cougar. The rest of his official line is less imposing: 3.5 tackles for loss, half a sack, one interception, no forced fumbles and no pass breakups.
There is nothing wrong with making the tackle that prevents an ordinary play from becoming a disaster. BYU needed plenty of those at UCF. A middle linebacker also has jobs that do not land in a box score, including setting the front, carrying routes through his zone and forcing a runner toward help.
Still, a national award case eventually needs lost downs.
Uluave produced two tackles for loss in the opener, picked off Arizona and added a half tackle for loss against Iowa State plus a full one against Notre Dame. He has not recorded a tackle for loss in four of seven games. His only half-sack came against Iowa State.
That split explains both his value and the remaining argument. BYU can count on Uluave to arrive. The next step is arriving before the offense gets what it wanted.
The Notre Dame game offered the strongest version. Uluave made nine tackles, six solo, with a tackle for loss. BYU’s official award release also credited him with three quarterback hurries. The Cougars held an offense that entered averaging 44 points and 195 rushing yards to 24 points and 115 on the ground.
That performance combined finish with disruption. It is the game Uluave needs to reproduce, not because every opponent resembles Notre Dame, but because it shows his tackle total can come with control.
Our Notre Dame recap focused on the two decisive drives. Uluave’s work made those drives possible. BYU forced a three-and-out after Bear Bachmeier’s late interception, then gave the offense one more possession to win the game. A linebacker award case should include the snaps that give a team another chance.
The semifinal field puts his season in real company
The Butkus semifinal list has 15 names. Uluave is one of two Big 12 players, alongside Texas Tech’s Ben Roberts. Notre Dame’s Drayk Bowen also made the cut, giving Uluave a direct comparison from BYU’s biggest win.
The field is much smaller than the 51-player preseason watch list. Uluave has moved from preseason possibility to a group that the selection committee believes has done enough through October to remain in the race.
That is meaningful. It is not proof that he ranks first, fifth or 15th.
The award’s own criteria help keep the evaluation honest. The selection committee includes coaches, professional scouts, former players and media members. The Butkus Foundation says candidates are judged on consistent performance and the traits associated with the position. It does not publish a formula that converts tackles, sacks and wins into a ballot.
Uluave’s statistical case is therefore best understood as a pattern:
- He leads a ranked team in tackles by 11.
- His production increased against the hardest part of the schedule.
- He delivered his best all-around game in BYU’s win over Notre Dame.
- He has one takeaway and only 3.5 tackles for loss, leaving room for more disruptive plays.
- His defense is coming off a 39-point loss that makes the response part of his candidacy.
The first three points got him into the semifinal. The last two may decide whether he reaches the finalist round.
Arizona State tests the part UCF exposed
BYU hosts Arizona State on Saturday at 1:30 p.m. Mountain. The Arizona State game center has the permanent score, schedule and source path, while the dedicated watch guide has the FOX and radio details.
The opponent arrives at exactly the right time to test Uluave’s case.
BYU’s problem at UCF was not a shortage of credited tackles. It was the space that remained before those tackles arrived. The Knights gained 179 receiving yards after the catch according to Deseret News’ postgame reporting, ran for 170 yards and escaped third-and-long underneath. Our 179-YAC review argued that the finish, rather than the disputed overtime penalty, has to drive the repair.
Uluave sits in the middle of that repair. He has to close the checkdown without overrunning it, fit the run without opening a cutback and get the next defender aligned behind him. A 10-tackle game can still be a bad defensive afternoon if too many of the tackles happen after the sticks.
Arizona State’s Cardae Mack scored all four Sun Devil touchdowns in the 28-17 win over Kansas State. BYU does not need Uluave to chase an award statistic on every snap. It needs him to keep a versatile ball carrier from turning first contact into the next problem.
A strong Saturday would look less like a personal box-score hunt and more like this:
| Butkus checkpoint | What BYU needs against Arizona State |
|---|---|
| Run fit | Meet the runner before the crease reaches the secondary |
| Space tackling | Keep short catches from becoming first downs |
| Disruption | Add a lost-yardage play, pressure or takeaway |
| Communication | Prevent the coverage leaks that create free yards |
| Finish | Turn third-and-long into a punt instead of another series |
If Uluave reaches 10 tackles because Arizona State runs 80 plays, the number will not say enough. If he makes six and BYU repeatedly gets off the field, that may be the better linebacker game.
The transfer gamble has already paid off
Uluave came to BYU after three seasons at Cal. He brought 237 career tackles, 21.5 tackles for loss, six sacks and three interceptions. He had already been a first-team All-ACC linebacker in 2025.
BYU was not buying a mystery. It was asking an established player to become the center of a different defense in one offseason.
Seven games in, that part has worked. Uluave is BYU’s leading tackler, its defensive player of the week from the Notre Dame win and now a national award semifinalist. His 31 tackles over four games show that the role has grown as the season has demanded more from him.
The case is not finished, and that is the interesting part. Uluave has four regular-season games left before the Butkus finalists are announced Nov. 20. The first comes against an Arizona State offense that will ask whether BYU fixed the open-field failures from Orlando.
Forty-five tackles got his name onto the smaller list. The next stage will depend on where the next tackle happens, what down it ends and whether BYU’s defense looks whole again when he makes it.
Sources and further reading
- BYU Athletics: Uluave named a Butkus Award semifinalist for the official 15-player field, season totals, finalist timeline and Cal career record.
- BYU Athletics: Cade Uluave player page for the official seven-game defensive log, solo tackles, tackles for loss, sack and interception.
- Butkus Foundation: 2026 watch-list release and selection criteria for the 51-player starting field, committee makeup and stated evaluation traits.
- National College Football Awards Association: Butkus Award for the Nov. 20 finalist date and award description.
- BYU Athletics: Uluave named Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week for his Notre Dame line, three hurries and the opponent’s entering scoring and rushing averages.
- BYU Cougars Wire: Uluave’s four-game tackle rise for independent confirmation of the 14/31 tackle split and his 11-tackle team lead.
- Arizona State Athletics: 28-17 Kansas State win for the Sun Devils’ latest result and Cardae Mack’s four touchdowns.
- BYU Sport Nuts: Cade Uluave player page, Notre Dame recap, UCF defensive review, Arizona State game center and football schedule.
