Kayla Saager-Beckley, the wife of outside linebackers coach John Beckley, passed away on September 9 in Tulsa. Binghamton Athletics listed her age as 30. Beckley and his wife had been married only about three months after moving to Tulsa for his job. 

“We had a memorial for her last night. We just ask that you please pray for the Saager family, the Beckley family,” Tre Lamb said while opening Tulsa’s September 14 weekly football press conference. “We’re going to honor her with a helmet sticker this week at our game, and she’s definitely in our thoughts and prayers,” he added. 

The public record on this is still not officially confirmed. Lamb said she was working out and was found unresponsive about 10 minutes later. He said it happened around 7 a.m. Wednesday, September 9, in Tulsa.

Similar to the presser post on X, Binghamton Athletics also listed that date and city. No official medical cause has been released. What is known is a sudden collapse while she was working out. She was expecting and was with the couple’s first child, who would be named Sawyer.

The program still played after she died. Tulsa went to Sam Houston on September 12 and won 23-17. Binghamton announced her passing on September 10. She is survived by her husband, her parents Ron and Noranne Saager, and her sisters Rachel and Veronica. 

She was not defined only by this week in Tulsa. Kayla was a soccer player and coach before she ever became part of a football staff’s family.

Kayla’s soccer path and Tulsa’s tribute

After playing at NC State and West Virginia, Saager-Beckley became a Binghamton captain. She scored 22 goals in two seasons there and was named 2017 America East Striker of the Year. Kayla also played professionally in the Czech Republic.

She then spent four years as an assistant women’s soccer coach at Troy University and earned a master’s degree in health and physical education there. After that, she worked as a college soccer scout and recruiter for National Scouting Report. 

Troy is also where the story of the couple started. They met at a Troy University baseball game. He was a new football graduate assistant on the safeties staff, and she was coaching soccer. They dated through coaching moves and married June 4, 2026, in Sayville, New York. That was about three months before her passing.

Beckley joined Lamb’s Tulsa staff in 2025, and it was his first season with the Golden Hurricane. 2026 is his second. The couple moved to Tulsa because of that job.

The on-field honor comes Saturday, September 19, when Tulsa hosts East Texas A&M at H.A. Chapman Stadium. Tulsa is 2-0 after wins over Oklahoma State and Sam Houston. Players will wear a memorial sticker on their helmets Saturday. That is the only tribute Tulsa has confirmed so far.

Helmet stickers are not all the same in college football. Some schools use them after a big play or a win, and this one is because someone in the program’s family has passed away.

Tulsa has done that before. In 2021, the team wore a small “BY” decal for Bill Young, a former defensive coordinator who coached under John Cooper and later Philip Montgomery. Young died on March 17, 2021, at 74.

That sticker stayed with the team through the season. The gold helmets Tulsa wore in 2011 after 9/11 were not the same thing. Those were a special look for one game, not a name or set of initials for one person.