Brigham Young University is owned and operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is based in Salt Lake City, some 40 miles to the north of the campus.
One of the unspoken rules at BYU is that no student – perhaps I should have underlined the word NO – is ever allowed to contact one of the Church’s General Authorities which runs the day-to-day ecclesiastical operations of the worldwide faithful. Purposely so, because the University leaders do not want the men who run the Church to be inundated with every student so and so who has this or that issue they wanted to discuss with “The Brethren”. If you opened the floodgates for BYU students to call on the General Authorities for a personal or public issue, there would be gridlock in the Salt Lake Valley. But we’re not talking about reaching out to the Pope in the Vatican here. The men who run the 10+ million member LDS Church are in and of themselves some of the most successful businessmen in the world and preside over a multi-billion dollar Church operation. With faithful members of the Church freely self-tithing themselves of 10% of their gross earnings, the LDS Church over the decades has wisely invested their funds and is one of the wealthiest organized religions on the face of the planet. Besides having a Latter-day prophet at the head of the Church, the LDS Church members believe that Planet Earth is itself is overseen by a body of 12 men; a latter-day version of the original Church when Christ himself walked the Jordan Valley, amply called the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.
About one week before opening night, I was speaking with Carl McGown on who should give the opening prayer - which is a very big deal at any BYU athletic event - and he mentioned that one of the General Authorities, Elder L. Tom Perry was himself pretty much a Volleyball fanatic.
I asked McGown if he had any issues about me contacting Elder Perry’s office in Salt Lake City and inviting him to drive down to Provo and pray for his (McGown’s) team. Silently knowing that BYU was probably going to be crushed by Marv Dunphy’s Pepperdine squad, I figured the Cougars would stand in need of some divine intervention anyway. Okay, so even though BYU students were prevented from calling the Pope, I mean the General Authorities of the Church, that didn’t prevent me from doing so. I was an alumnus of BYU and not a student, so I was not beholden to these rules. I just stood to fracture my contract with the University but I thought, what the heck.
So I telephoned LDS Church Headquarters in Salt Lake City and finally reached Elder Perry’s secretary whom I sweet talked with for a few minutes before I spoke with the man himself. Now, for me to understand how to run a world-wide Church is a bit outside of my pay grade. I just wanted to make a major statement about the start of NCAA Men’s Volleyball at BYU.
I spoke with Elder Perry for a few minutes and he most graciously said that he would come down to the campus with his wife and offer the opening prayer.
Again let’s go back to the “Mormon” thing for a second. At BYU, when a General Authority shows up at a sporting event, it is about as big as it gets, unless the Prophet himself shows up. And when the Prophet of the Mormon Church does show up on the BYU Campus, like the President of the United States who walks in to the tune of “Hail to the Chief”, the entire student body, upon first seeing him, will immediately stop whatever they are doing, stand ramrod straight and sing – sing mind you – “We Thank Thee O God For A Prophet”, the text of which was written in the mid 1960’s by William Fowler, a convert to Mormonism. Perry is a few steps below the President of the LDS Church but the Mormon faithful still regard him as a “Prophet Seer and Revelator” in his own right. So about five minutes before the match was to begin, Elder Perry and his wife entered the Fieldhouse, sans the student body singing, and sat right behind me in pre-reserved front-row seats. Once the National Anthem was over, with the deepest baritone I could pull from my chest, said the following, “And now, offering tonight’s opening prayer, is Elder L. Tom Perry, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ... Brother Perry.”
I think it was then that 5,000 people probably collectively peed - right on the spot.
Instantly the riotous crowd went “Church Silent” and took a collective gasp as the 6’3” Perry stood and then stepped around my left side. I handed him the microphone; he looked down at me and winked, then closed his eyes. “O Heavenly Father” … Elder Perry started in on his prayer and the arena froze in time. It was no different than this giant of a man praying at the twice yearly General Conference of the LDS Church in Salt Lake City. For Mormons, the significance of Elder L. Tom Perry giving the opening prayer was nothing less than pure Heavenly energy coursing through the building. I have no doubt that with enough faith that night; Elder Perry could have easily opened up the ceiling and mystically/magically have created a skylight to appear and the sun to shine.
“In the name of Jesus Christ … Amen” and with the crowd giving it’s “amen”, Elder Perry handed the microphone back to me, extended his left hand to pat my shoulder and then returned to his seat. I immediately boarded in with announcing the starting six players of the Pepperdine Wave team on the left side of the court. Just name and position was all, then, “and the head coach of the Pepperdine Waves … Marv Dunphy”! That was followed by another roar from the crowd.
Now from here … everything went a bit off the rails.
***
When you have the opening night of any sporting event, you only have one chance to get it right. Such is life. So for weeks I was planning something … spectacular. Something that would put the Cougars on the Volleyball map for a decade. Something that had never been done before at any BYU athletic event.
Remember that I had been prowling the halls of the BYU Music Department? That is where I found the barbershop quartet. But that was an afterthought. I was really looking for were lighting technicians, who could illuminate the inside of Smith Fieldhouse in a way that has never been done before. I was lucky to come across one crusty old fellow, buried in the basement of the building who grinned ear to ear when I told him what my warped brain was considering turning into reality. The biggest issue was not if it could be done, but if anything went wrong in a building as old as Smith Fieldhouse, I stood to black out not only the BYU Campus and possibly the entire energy grid of Utah Valley in doing so. That would have been bad. Getting his triple re-assurance that I would not blow every circuit in the arena, I used the last of the meager $500 that McGown had given me as a marketing budget and hired four lighting technicians, arranged for all of their stage lighting equipment to be delivered three hours before the match was to begin (remember about being there at 4:00 p.m.) and paid them all - in advance - for their services.
I’m a believer in paying for things in advance. I will cook 4 kg of Southern Fried Chicken and freeze it just so I know that I have it. I will pay my rent for three months in advance. Yada. Yada. In this case, I had no issue paying the student technicians in advance, as well as their truckers to haul all of the equipment in and the helping hands to lift everything in place.
Let’s rewind the clock for just a second.
Three days before the match against Pepperdine was set to begin, McGown introduced me to his Volleyball players. They were sitting in the lower stands of the Fieldhouse and in front of them I explained every detail that was going to transpire on opening night. I could see their collective chins dropping when I explained how the team was going to be introduced. Then I introduced my “secret weapon” … the resident janitor and I explained his time-critical role. To me, he was the most important person in the arena. Not the BYU players and certainly not McGown nor his coaching staff as they were just passengers on my bus.
I would either make it to Heaven or crash and burn.
***
So as soon as the Pepperdine Waves team was introduced, the banging and cheering and the NOISE level ramped up to a fevered pitch. My blood pressure was about to burst my heart out of my chest and eight seconds later, the Smith Fieldhouse went dark.
As black as your bedroom at 3:30 a.m.
Four