Upcoming Event: Football at West Virginia on September 27, 2025 at 1:30 p.m.

9/22/2025 12:44 PM | Football
SALT LAKE CITY – University of Utah head football coach Kyle Whittingham held his weekly press conference on Monday with members of the media inside the Spence and Cleone Eccles Football Center.
Click here for the full press conference video.
Opening Statement…
Really impressed with Texas Tech's football team. A lot of talent on that roster, very well coached, played a really good game against us on Saturday, so give them a ton of credit. We were not real good on offense, needless to say. Didn't score enough points, didn't run the ball well, didn't throw the ball well, didn't convert third downs, or fourth downs, for that matter. And turned the ball over four times, which was really the most telling stat. You can't play a team of that caliber, turn the ball over four times and hope to have much of a chance to win. That was disappointing. We had been taking care of the football first three games very well and moving the ball very well, but just got bogged down, never got into any sort of rhythm on Saturday. A great deal of the credit and the reason for that is the way they play defense. I was very proud of our defense for three-and-a-half-quarters until we just couldn't finish the way we wanted to. The defense battled some ridiculous field positions. Seven of their 14 possessions started at the or the minus-44 or better for Texas Tech and that's a stress on a defense. I thought they held up exceptionally well all through it until the very end. Disappointed in that. Our defense takes a lot of pride in what they do, as does our whole football team for that matter, but just have to be better finishers than we were on Saturday. Some bright spots, punted the ball well. Punted a lot and we punted it well. We cut down the penalties. We had a concerted effort to not be as penalized as we were the week before. We had two for 10 yards, so that was a big positive, but other than that, it was a rough day. Tech has done a really good job of assembling that roster and putting it together. As I mentioned, they're well coached and they are really good football team and very deserving of whatever they're ranked this week and time to move on. We've got West Virginia on the road. It's obviously an East Coast road trip, so we'll leave on Thursday, a day early with a 3:30 p.m. kick. If it would have been a night kick, we probably would have just gone out Friday, but a little bit crowded when the kickoffs at 3:30 p.m. We'l take off Thursday and get to West Virginia then. Rich Rodriguez, excellent football coach, known Rich for a lot of years. Really had it going to Arizona there and really good offensive mind, outstanding offensive mind. I got no doubt that he's going to get that program where he wants to and where he had it before he was there last time around. He did an outstanding job, so got to bounce back, like I said, got to have a great week of practice. 24-hour rule, you lick your wounds for 24 hours, and then it's time to get back after it, put your head down and go to work.