PROVO — After opening as more than a touchdown underdog at home in their Big 12 opener, BYU made sure Kansas State kept its winless record at LaVell Edwards Stadium intact.

Jake Retzlaff threw for 149 yards and two touchdowns, Sione I. Moa added 76 yards and a score on the ground, and the Cougars handed the 13th-ranked Wildcats their first loss of the season 38-9 in front of a capacity crowd of 64,201 fans.

But the genius of the first win over Kansas State since the Cotton Bowl on New Year’s Day in 1997 was defensive coordinator Jay Hill, and the Mad Hatter’s defense.

The Cougars (4-0, 1-0 Big 12) held the Wildcats to 363 yards of offense, harassing quarterback Avery Johnson for five tackles for loss, five quarterback hurries and a pair of interceptions that turned a defensive slugfest into something resembling a rout.

Harrison Taggart and Tyler Batty each picked off the rising sophomore signal caller playing in his first power conference road game of his collegiate career, and Jack Kelly added a sack and a forced fumble to go along with his four tackles.

And then there was the crowd. In what several players noted was the loudest crowd of their careers — Batty said it may have been louder than the deafening roar heard across ESPN in 2021 when BYU knocked off Arizona State — the Wildcats struggled with eight penalties for 50 yards to just two against BYU.

“Not error-free,” BYU head coach Kalani Sitake said, “but the energy and the effort was there.

“We’re excited about the win,” he added. “But we’ve got to get ready for our next statement, which is Statement 5 next weekend.”

“Statement 4” was pretty good, too — at least from a defensive standpoint, though special teams and an offense that got stronger as the game wore on had a few moments, too.

Johnson completed 15-of-28 passes for 130 yards and two interceptions, and DJ Giddens ran for 93 yards on 19 carries for Kansas State (3-1, 0-1 Big 12), who outgained the Cougars’ 241 yards on offense but never found the end zone.

After exchanging three total field goals through most of the first two quarters, BYU made the first big play — and it came on defense.

Moments after Will Ferrin pulled the Cougars within 3 with a 31-yard field goal, Kelly forced a fumble out of Giddens’ hands.

From among a group of white shirts, Tommy Prassas emerged and returned the loose ball 30 yards for his first career touchdown that gave the Cougars a 10-6 lead with 1:08 until halftime.

Two plays later, Batty recorded his first career interception, and Retzlaff found Chase Roberts for a 23-yard touchdown with 29 seconds on the first-half clock to go up 17-6 at the break.

BYU posted just 135 yards on offense in the first half, including 125 yards through the arm of Retzlaff. But defensively, the Cougars feasted with a sack, four quarterback hurries and Taggart’s eight tackles that held the Wildcats to 167 yards on offense.

Taggart opened the second half with an interception, and Retzlaff cashed in on the turnover — again — with a two-play, 27-yard drive and a 3-yard touchdown to Darius Lassiter.

In just over three minutes of game time, BYU went from a 6-3 deficit to a 24-6 advantage over the No. 13 team in the country.

“It’s crazy,” said Taggart, who also had a career-high 10 tackles. “When we punched the ball out and Tommy Prassas picked it up in the end zone, I was running down with Jack Kelly about six inches apart and we couldn’t hear each other. Momentum is a huge part of the game, and that ROC was awesome.”

And that wasn’t the end of it.

Parker Kingston stretched the scoring run to 31-0 with an encircling, 90-yard touchdown off a punt return with 10:45 showing in the third quarter.

The former Roy High quarterback converted the Cougars’ first punt return for a touchdown since JD Falslev against Middle Tennessee in 2013 moments before expelling a Beefy 5-layer Burrito on the sideline.

“That was a whirlwind,” Batty said. “It was a ton of fun. That middle-eight was a ton of fun. Just building off each other’s momentum, and not getting down on each other when we were down 6-0.

“We’re going to wait for those opportunities, and when those opportunities happen, we’re going to capitalize.”

BYU held Kansas State out of the end zone all night, though Chris Tennant had three field goals, including a 28-yarder with 5:14 left in the third quarter.

Moa piled it on with a 21-yard touchdown run, the first of his career with 12:02 left in the fourth quarter. The former Timpview standout spun off a pair of would-be tacklers on the Cougars’ opening drive of the final period before dashing into the corner of the end zone to stretch the host’s lead to 38-9 on Ferrin’s extra point.

“A lot of people were surprised by this; they didn’t think that we could do this,” said Moa, who recently returned from a two-year church mission and was off the depth chart as recently as Monday, buried beneath a top-four of LJ Martin, Folau Ropati, Miles Davis and Enoch Nawahine, among others. “But as all our coaches say, especially Kalani, this is not a surprise for us. We know the work we put in to get to this point.

“We’ve always had that belief in trust in each other in the locker room. And now on Saturday nights, we’re ready to show it.”