The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Willie Fritz Joins Before Weekend Match vs Arizona

Episode Date: October 16, 2025

Willie Fritz Joins Before Weekend Match vs Arizona

We're tonight the Rocks to take on the hawks. Let's spend a few minutes right now with the head football coach of your Cougars, my Cougars, America's Cougars. Very impressive win against Oklahoma State back home for a Saturday tilt with Arizona, 11 o'clock start time at TDECU Stadium. Willie Fritz is with us on the show. Willie, first of all, congratulations. 7-0 Oklahoma State started off.

A lot of trick plays early on. Once things got settled down, you guys took over. Were you surprised at the amount of trick? that Oklahoma State tried to throw at you guys, especially in that first half. Well, they've been doing it, you know, the last couple of ball games. They've got an interim head coach and really, you know, all their play callers. You know, why not? You know, I told our kids, you know, they're going to throw the kitchen.

St. Cat had us, and we've got to do a great job of having good eyes on every single play. You know, for the most part we did. But early in the ball game, they ran a little double pass and sent a backup of a shoot. and unfortunately we rallied for the first throw, and they had two throws involved in the play. But after that, we settled down and played pretty darn good. I don't think we gave up another trick play after that. You settled down.

Your offense was great. You got a lot of different receivers involved. That had to be pleasing, especially for guys that are running those routes and practicing hard during the week to finally see their name being called in a play and to reach the end zone and have the big numbers they had. It had to be very pleasing to that group. Yeah, I really did. We threw for over 300 and rushed for almost 200 yards, Harvey Broussard, who's done a great job in practice, kind of like you were saying.

And as this hasn't had a chance to get much action in the game, he had some really big-time catches for us and also forced a big 15-yard penalty. Sometimes that doesn't show up on the stat sheet, but you know, you're throwing the ball deep and you beat the defender. He has to go ahead and interfere with you. That's still a huge play for you. But we were glad to see Harvey get going. Was there a part of you that had to have gotten the guys on the bus

and the pregame hype and at the stadium to say, look, we had a disappointing loss against Texas Tech. Oklahoma State's going through transition. Let's get out to a fast start because you don't want a team like that who's all fighting for positions in their future to make this a ballgame. And really after that first touchdown they scored, it really wasn't much of a ball game. Yeah, you know, we kind of took care of all that on the Monday, you know, after the previous game.

And I always talk about, you know, every week is its own season and flesh in the previous game, whether you won or lost, go down the toilet and doing everything you can to play better and keep it proven every single week. And that's what elite people do. Elite teams do. They're able to focus and concentrate day after day after day after day. and he's stacking up good days on top of each other. You're going to improve and be the very best you can possibly be.

So the guys, I thought we had a good week of practice. And, you know, in this big 12, you've got to do that every single week. Everybody's pretty darn good. And, you know, we just want to keep striving to play that perfect game. Willie, you were talking about getting some different guys involved. When you were coaching and managing a roster, you were thinking about some red shirts and whatnot and getting guys in and maybe burning them. I don't know if that's even a possibility much anymore because of the portal and guys moving

left and right, but do you, especially for the kids you have recruited that you said maybe they're not ready to go just yet, but we can sneak them in. Are you spending as much time you and your staff about who's playing red shirts or is that just the kind of thing of the past now? No, we do talk about that. But I tell all our guys all hands on deck at the beginning of the year. I said anybody who's, you know, wanted to play just four games and then decide to redshirt, you know, just go ahead and head on out the door. We're wanting everybody in,

all in for the coogs. You know, but when you start getting to this point of the year and the guys only played a little bit, that does come into your thought, your thought process. So there's a few guys that will end up being redshirted, but, you know, I don't have a crystal ball. I don't know what's where we're going to be at in two, three, four weeks. You know, so we just want everybody all in on the 25 coogs. Willie, you got an Arizona team coming in, a double overtime loss to BYU. As you looked at that game tape,

they played a late-night game. A thought or two about what they did well, and do you anticipate another game like that where they could come down to a final possession late in the contest? Yeah, you know, it possibly could. You know, they had a long game. They had a rain delay. I think the game actually lasted, you know,

over five hours from the beginning until the very end. They were up, and BYU did a great job of getting a field goal, I think it was five minutes to go and then score with just a few seconds left to send it into overtime. But this is a very talented Arizona team. The quarterback probably going to end up being their all-time leading passer in school history, and they've had a lot of great quarterbacks out there at Arizona. And good receiving core, they've run the ball very successfully.

Defensively, they really throw a lot. lot at you. They're, you know, three-man front, four-man front. They'll bring guys from the second level. They'll blitz. They'll drop, you know, defensive linemen at times. So, you know, it's a team we've really had to study early in the week, you know, just with our scout team to make sure those guys line up properly and give our guys a good look. And of the kids now acclimated this early start time. We had the 11 o'clock kickoff last week in Stillwater. No plane trip this time around, but still a fairly early wake-up call for the boys. Yeah, you know, we practice every morning.

So we start our meetings at 7 a.m. So tell our guys we get to sleep in a little bit. So I think they're excited about it. Willie, thank you for the time. By the way, a sixth win gets his Cougar football program back to the Bowls, and that's something we need to be on a regular basis. I don't know if that's a huge thing for your kids that are in that locker room now, but for an alumni base that has seen some leaner times,

It's a pretty big accomplishment you could be getting here on this game against the Wildcats. Well, our big goal, obviously, is to win this week. We just want to do that every single week. You know, do the very best we can't keep improving, and good things will happen for Houston. And we'll leave it with that. Coach, thank you for the time, as always. Really appreciate it, and best luck on that midday Saturday.

Thanks for having me on. Go Coogs. Thank you. Willie Fritz with us here on Sports Talk 790.