First, it is revisionist history when you only share the facts that help support your theory. My responses below your comments:

2001...12-1

(riding high on the fruits of Lavell, with Doman and Staley, doesn't take a good coach to succeed)

2002...5-7

(you don't share the SOS here, is that because it doesn't support your narrative? 1st of three seasons where we have a losing record, lost to teams we shouldn't lose to: Nevada, Air Force, Colorado St., New Mexico)

2003...4-8 (played the #14 SOS)

(if you don't win any games, then a good SOS doesn't say the team is good, it just gives an excuse for why we were that terrible, along with good/decent teams we also lost to: Air Force by 14, CSU by 45, Wyoming by 3)

2004...5-6 (played the #11 SOS, lost to #1 USC, #5 Utah and #14 BSU. We literally were 6 inches away from beating a ranked team on the road and finishing 6-5)

(again, if you don't win big games, SOS doesn't mean anything other than maybe you don't stink quite as bad as your record...but you probably still stink, e.g. loses to: UNLV, UNM. crushed by: standford, usc, and utah)

2005...6-6 (played the #72 SOS, returned a 2 yr starting QB, most of the offense from the year before)

(And for all the props you give for almost beating Boise in 2004 you fail to mention that BYU lost to TCU by 1 in overtime and to Utah by 7 in overtime. Really close games. One, maybe two, things go different in the 4th quarter and we come out of the season 8-4. The difference in SOS means nothing. All it says is there wasn't a ton of improvement from Crowton's crappy team in 2002-2004 to Bronco's first year. Kalani and company didn't out-perform Bronco's last year, generally it takes a little time when implementing your own defense/offense. So give him a year to really get established and what does he give us? 11-2, 4 points and a double overtime away from a perfect season, crushed Oregon in a bowl game, beat number 15 TCU, perfect in conference play.)

Now I have shown you the other possible extreme narrative. Likely it is somewhere in the middle, not everything that went wrong was Crowton's fault and not everything that went right was Bronco's. So for instance: Crowton and his staff recruited most the guys playing in 2006, but on the other hand would they have reached that same level of potential under a Crowton run team?

Crowton was just plain wrong for the BYU head coaching position. I don't think lavell left this program ready to be tanked. You can't blame three straight losing seasons on anyone but Crowton, sure his SOS contributed to how bad they were, but there were winnable games that he lost.

Sometimes a large group of people come to the same conclusion not because "group think", but because the conclusion they come up with is true and it is readily apparent. Bronco was a much better coach than Crowton, the ship was not floating while Crowton was here (three losing seasons and extra-curricular crap). Bronco brought helped right that sunken or sinking ship. Is Bronco a savior of BYU football? Not sure we will ever know. What do you think would have happened if Crowton had remained in command through the end of the 2015 season?