UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT SAN ANTONIO FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 17, 2026

Jeff Traylor

Press Conference

UTSA 38, Navy 34

Q. I'm sorry to have to ask this, but do you know anything about the soldier that got injured?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yeah. What I heard happened is heartbreaking, but I want to give the family time. They're in our prayers. It's tragic.

Q. What did you see out of your team in that fourth quarter?

JEFF TRAYLOR: They just done a lot of things early in the game we hadn't seen, from a blitz pattern to their use of five. That was a really good change-up for them. We finally got that adjustment made, and then they went to the tricks and the play action passes. Our kids just -- they play one play at a time, and we say it all the time around here, a champion has the ability to play one play longer. We just made one more play. It's sad, we jumped offsides at the end of the game or we'd have been almost -- pretty good offensively tonight.

Q. Four lead changes in the fourth quarter. You told us every game would be pretty dramatic coming down the stretch. What can you say about how your team handles these moments week after week?

JEFF TRAYLOR: I know I answer the same way every week. We just don't go away. We don't blink. We just don't. Our kids just keep trusting, and our coaches, they keep making adjustments. Their attitudes stay wonderful. We made some great adjustments, Navy made some great adjustments.

I'm a big fan of their coach and the way their guys play ball. I think they do it the right way. I hate it for Brian; he's got a really good team. His record deserves to be better than what it is.

Winning college football games is hard. I don't think people appreciate how hard it is to win a game.

Q. You guys got two 75-yard touchdown drives there late when you have to have them. What was going right for your offense in that stretch?

JEFF TRAYLOR: They do a great job. They just kept changing up their looks. They were giving us trouble with certain things they were doing. We didn't have answers. We got some answers. We had a really good answer there late.

I guess make adjustments. I just don't want to give all the details. I'm sure Will is in Tulane right now watching and having a great time, ready for the Roadrunners to come to New Orleans. They're playing really good right now, so we've got our work cut out for us again. My team is beat up. We were physically beat up. We haven't have a bye, and I'm not sure we're getting one until we get to Florida, FAU on a short week. So is that a bye? I don't know. We're going to just have to man up.

Q. It was 4th and 3 when you were down three points in your own territory, and you decided to go for it. What factored into that decision there, and then what were your thoughts after McCown converts to AJ Wilson on that play?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yeah, we did it earlier too. We did a 4th and -- I don't know what it was. I know we had one the first half too. I know how they play football, and they're going to keep the ball from us, and if I was going down, I'm going down with two slinging. I'm not going down any other way. You don't get in these chairs by taking the ball away from great athletes. You let athletes be athletes. I'm letting Owen McCown win the game for me. End of story.

Q. What did you see out of your run game this game? It seemed like that was big down the stretch for you guys.

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yeah, we struggled. Man, we really struggled. We had 22 yards at halftime. We thought our match-up was better in the back end. We didn't think our match-up was real good up front. They're really good defending the run. They're really good at running the ball. We thought we had an advantage with our athletic ability getting the ball down the field, so we spent a lot of time doing that this week. We thought if we kept chipping away, our run game would get going eventually, and I'm not even sure -- I'm sure they've given it to me. I couldn't even tell you how many yards we had. I don't think it was very many. Did we even hit 109?

Q. 110.

JEFF TRAYLOR: 110, which was probably -- other than Texas, probably a season low. I don't know that, but...

Q. I know when you look at the film, I think the explosives are going to jump out on the defense, but what does it mean for your defense to come up with two stops there at the end of the game?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yeah, we were hoping -- I know y'all are going to be like, man, you've got low standards. We were hoping we could bat .500 on defense. We thought if we batted .500 -- they don't get stopped, they just turn the ball over. Nobody stops them. They just turn it over.

Did we turn them over one time? We didn't get one turnover, and they had four last week in the first half. I think the ball did hit the ground twice in the second half, but we didn't get either one of them.

When they don't turn it over, they're a nightmare, so we wanted to bat .500, and we batted .500. We hoped our offense would bat .550 and the field goal was nice and put us over the top.

Q. You were pretty upset on a no-call there late in the game, took some restraining to hold you back a little bit. What was the explanation there? What did they tell you down on the sideline?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Next.

Q. Your quarterback, I believe 28 of 38 passes, his ability to put the team on his back a little bit and pass that many times and still hold up three touchdowns and no interceptions, just talk about him, the way he performed tonight?

JEFF TRAYLOR: He got rocked tonight now. He took a rough night. He got rocked early. I was worried about him. I really was. The dude is John Wayne. He just John Wayne, rub some dirt on it, put some tobacco on it and let's ride.

Q. A couple of your scoring drives required some pretty critical third or 4th down conversions. Was there anything that stood out that allowed you guys to come through in those moments as you looked at those?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yeah, our O-line protected a lot better as the game went, made some great adjustments up front. Did a good job checking the ball down to our backs. Kids made some plays. The catch AJ went up and made, man, the catch Jamel Hardy made on 3rd and 13, 3rd and 11. We had some kids make plays. I think we had seven different players have a big play tonight.

Q. You guys fell behind 14-0 early and then got it flipped in the second quarter, including the surprise onside kick. Why was that important, and what did it take to flip that as fast as you did?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yeah, again, I didn't feel good about stopping them a lot. I just wanted to get a possession. Y'all have seen me do that quite a bit before, honestly. It was there. I don't do it unless it's there. I don't just randomly do stuff, believe it or not. I know y'all think you do. My behavior on the sideline is random at times, button side kick was not random. We thought through it a lot. It was well executed by our freshman. He had a really good night kicking the ball. He kicked the ball well.

Q. It seems like ages ago, but you met Freddy from Twitter, I guess, before the game. I guess it was a little bit of a marketing thing. Did you know who he was? What's the story behind meeting him, and what did you know about him before you met him?

JEFF TRAYLOR: I know y'all don't believe me, but I'm totally off social media, so I had no clue. All Mike told me, Mike asked me, my general manager, did you check your phone before you got here; I warned you what you were walking into. I said, no, I'm off my phone. He said, well, there's a guy here named Freddy that's been all over the world, got a bunch of followers, probably your child -- Jake and Jaci might know who he is ^ check. That's all Mike told me. I'll have to ask my children. But I heard he's cool. I was nice to him.

I did tell him I'd go to Fredericksburg with him tomorrow if we won, so I might have to do that. Hoping he doesn't hold me up on that deal. If tomorrow y'all cut me some slack if I'm in Fredericksburg having wine trying to raise money for the Roadrunners. Maybe it'll become -- this might be our NIL deal. This might be our rev share moment. Fund me $55 million and I'll go to Fredericksburg all day with him.

Q. Braxton Woodson was kind of a wildcard for Navy with what he might bring and if he might be available in this game at all. How did you try to account for him and what sort of adjustments did that require?

JEFF TRAYLOR: I don't know what's going on there. I think the quarterback is Gutierrez and they're using him in other ways. I think they did a good job. I think Brian did a fantastic job. He's a freak of an athlete. He's hard to get down. He has a nice little change-up. They got our attention. I bet it got y'all's too.

Q. Gutierrez was really productive --

JEFF TRAYLOR: He's awesome.

Q. What can you say about what he did?

JEFF TRAYLOR: He's a freaking stud. You think he's down. He's not. He's competitive. He's a winner. I know Gary is proud of him, his father. I've been texting his father all year how great his dang kid is. He's a ball player. I don't think there's anything to talk about there. I think he's just a really good quarterback.

Q. Apart from the playing style differences, did you see a lot of déjà-vu in how the game played out, going down 14-0 starting off?

JEFF TRAYLOR: I can't wait until I'm sitting up in the stands with my children one day and I'm looking at a game that way. I just don't get to see a game like that. That's just not how we look at it. Y'all see 14-0. I see three-and-out and we couldn't pick up a pressure. I see throwing hot to a running back that we didn't have to throw hot to. I'm just looking at different stuff, right.

But yes, if I were to get in my journal and look at it and go, geez, we got down 14-0 again, what am I doing wrong at halftime.

I knew when they took the ball, and out of the last 18 coin tosses, they've only taken the ball three times. I knew they were telling me something then. I knew they were telling me they think our offense is really good, and they've got to score a lot tonight.

You can learn a lot just by some subtle things. That's what I felt like. Then they came out, went right down the field and scored so we were down 7-0 with three-and-out immediately and it's 14-0. But I thought that was a huge, huge answer from Mekhi Anderson and the throw he made to get back to 14-7. That was a huge answer.

The problem then was it only took a minute, and my defense had been out there the whole first quarter. So we needed it to last a little bit longer. But beggars can't be choosers, right?

Q. Your Roadrunners are 6-1 and 3-0 in conference. How does that feel? What does that mean?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Surreal. I know I'm going to have to listen to you because you've been telling me this was going to be this way all year and I've been telling you to quit jinxing us because you always jinx everything. You're doing it right now like you always do.

We've got to play Tulane, and we've got to get ready. New Orleans is a hard place to win. They've been in the championship game the last four years. Will is a great coach. He's got a good team. He's got a good freshman quarterback now. They just beat Memphis. They're going to give us heck.

Q. I hate to harp back on the pregame incident, but when something like that happens and it has such a profound effect on the crowd, the crowd that's known for its rowdiness, do you guys feel that when you come out of the locker room, and what was the challenge of trying to get them back into the game after witnessing something like that?

JEFF TRAYLOR: Yes, we did. There was something -- you could just tell the energy was just gone. I've never had to deal with anything like that before. It just puts things into perspective. It really does.

Q. What did it mean that the fans stuck with you to support you guys in a game like this where you needed them late in the stretch?

JEFF TRAYLOR: They got rowdy there in the fourth now. They got rowdy in the fourth. It's tough. I can't imagine. Fans, everybody that was out there, I can't imagine.

Q. Do you talk to the players about that before the game, or how do you address it with the group?

JEFF TRAYLOR: I didn't know. I didn't have any information. The only information I had was there had been an incident and the game was going to be delayed, and we didn't expand upon it any more than that.

I actually thought about -- I didn't know if I did the right thing or not. I didn't know anything. I didn't know what to tell them. That's how I handled it.