UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 12, 2026

Mason Heintschel

Press Conference

Pitt - 12, UCF - 7

Q. How much did the weather affect the offense tonight?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: Made it tough to throw the football for sure. I felt like just about every time I caught the snap, it was soaking wet in my hand. I don't have the biggest hands in the world. That doesn't really help a whole lot.

But kudos to the offensive line for just staying in it and putting their heads down and gritting it through. Wide receivers did a great job blocking on the perimeter, and running backs really took care of the football. That's all you can ask for in weather like this is not having any turnovers. They did a great job of that. So proud of those guys, for sure.

Q. (Inaudible) were there throws you saw that you might have held back against because of the rain, trying to protect your team there?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: Yeah, no doubt. I think when we've got something that it's a little deeper and I know I can't get everything into it, I'm not going to try to force it downfield. Especially with the coverages they were playing, we got a lot of deep zone from them. So just check it down and let our guys underneath go catch and run. We did a great job of that.

Like you said, we had some open shots downfield. But just couldn't with the weather. And all that kind of stuff couldn't hit them. I'm glad we came out with a win, for sure.

Q. What does it say about the play of your defense?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: Stellar. Stellar. They worked their tails off. It always sucks when you can't really get anything going offensively. We can't punch it in. You feel bad for the defense.

But they just went out there and gritted it out. And that's all you can ask for from our defense. They played their tails off like I said.

That's a good football team. And they held their offense in check. So proud of those guys. Really appreciative of those guys and excited for what they're going to do the rest of the year.

Q. (Inaudible) Damon, and on that touchdown run as he's dragging people into the end zone?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: He's a great player. Young cat. And he works his tail off day in and day out. He's a smart football player, too. And I kind learned that today. He did a lot of really great things.

And that touchdown run was a credit to him and our offensive line. Got the look we wanted and ran the ball. We got a great push up front. He hit it well and kept his feet churning. Just speaks to how hard he works and the type of player he is. Very proud of those guys. We earned that one for sure.

Q. Mason, with how tight this one ended up being, how impactful was just holding onto the ball, the time of possession? I mean even on the drives you guys came up empty with, it seemed like you were able to just shave minutes off the clock throughout the game.

MASON HEINTSCHEL: Yeah, that was big time. Obviously trying to get first downs as much as we can. And that was one of the things that we were a little unhappy about is not being able to kind of move the sticks a couple times and keep our defense off the field.

But you know to be able to shave some clock off and just kind of, like you said, take some time off, it was big for the defense tore give them a breather.

And our punter did a great job of flipping the fields, too. That's big time for us. Just an all-around complete game by our guys considering the situations. Very proud of them.

Q. Sometime after the 18-play drive that you guys had that you were pumping up your teammates in the huddle. Were you frustrated not to punch the ball in there and how do you guys do that now going forward?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: 100 percent. You know we've got to finish. We gotta finish in the red zone. We've got to finish on the goal line and all that kind of stuff. We expect touchdowns every time we get down into that area.

Everybody knew it. Everybody knew what we needed to get done. And we responded well. We ended up going down and scoring, I think that was the next drive or a couple of drives after.

Proud of our guys. Defense, again, played their tails off. Just trying to get those keep those guys motivated. It's tough. Like I said, Mother Nature was not on our side today. So they pushed through they persevered and proud of our guys.

Q. How hyped do you get when your defense gets a sack?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: It's huge. Because you know how it feels to get sacked. And when we can get a hit on the quarterback, they come out and make a play that's big for us. And we did a really great job of rushing the passer today. And the boys were flying around on defense proud of those guys.

Q. How did you guys know that you didn't have Boosty (phonetic) available? He was a big part of your offense, and you not to have especially in a weather game like this, imagine that would take a bit of adjustment.

MASON HEINTSCHEL: Yeah, 100 percent. I didn't really know whether he was not gonna play. That's something that you're gonna have to ask Coach Duze. But I think our other guys stepped up really well. Boosty is a great player but we got a lot of great guys in that backfield, in that running back room.

And everybody played really well today. And proud of those guys. They were hitting it really well and trusting it. And we got some things to clean up, but I think we'll be all right.

Q. From your perspective, what did UCF do schematically -- or rather how did what UCF do schematically compared to what you prepared for?

MASON HEINTSCHEL: They did a lot of what we thought they were going to do. When they played zone they played a lot of cover 2, 2 invert. And played a lot of deep coverage when they were playing zone, and then they manned us up.

And it's tougher with the rain. We started getting a little bit more man, and we're hoping that you can kind of take your shots on that, but with the wet ball it's tough. I gotta try and figure out how to get through that.

But I think what they did schematically was kind of what we prepared for. So you know we weren't really surprised by anything that they did.