POP-TARTS BOWL: BYU VS GEORGIA TECH

December 7, 2025

Brent Key

Camping World Stadium

Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Welcome to our head coach press conference here for the Pop-Tarts Bowl. We're looking forward to welcoming Georgia Tech and BYU to Orlando for the game on Saturday, December 27th.

Coach Key, if you want to kick us off with a statement about the Georgia Tech's upcoming matchup with BYU in the Pop-Tarts Bowl, the floor is yours.

BRENT KEY: Excited to be part of the Pop-Tarts Bowl. Excited to make a return back to Orlando. We've had a lot of great years of my career, in my life and with my wife in Orlando. Got married while we were there. Had a lot of great years coaching at UCF and a lot of great friends down there. Just a wonderful city. So many great things about it.

It's a game that, actually, before it was Pop-Tarts in its history of the games … it was actually the first bowl game that I ever played in as a player, when it was the Carquest Bowl back in 1997 in Miami. It had just from the Blockbuster Bowl to the Carquest Bowl. We played West Virginia in the game, had a really good game, and it held us into the off-season into the next year.

Really, really excited to play BYU. What a great team. Great coach. He's done an unbelievable job. Only had the pleasure of beating him one time, once or twice, and just can't say enough great things about him and the program, what they've done and the year they've had.

An outstanding matchup. Two really good teams and also two teams that go about doing things the right way and have high values, high character, want to play with toughness and discipline. So this should be a really, really good football game.

Excited to get to Orlando and get things rolling here.

Q. You obviously spoke glowingly about Orlando. Two-part question for you: How did your time in that city and with UCF make you into the coach you are today? The second one probably more important what's your favorite Pop-Tart?

BRENT KEY: Strawberry. I like the frosted, the different frosted glazes on the top. I'm a big Pop-Tart guy. Even if I've had breakfast, throw them down.

Orlando is such a huge part of my life. Me as a man, me as a father, a husband, but also as a football coach. There's a little running joke we have in there with the guys that have worked with Coach O'Leary that you talk about dog years. I think we were there 12 years. In dog year terms it was a lot longer than that.

That's where I really learned how to be a football coach. I learned how to handle adversity, setbacks, ups and downs, as far as learning the processes of what it takes to be a head coach.

Coached a lot of really, really good players, a lot of great memories. Still have great relationships with those players and coaches that we were all together. Gosh, it's been almost 10 years ago now, but a lot of great memories, a lot of great friendships.

Q. Who will be the primary offensive play caller in the bowl game?

BRENT KEY: I have made that decision. I'm going to visit with the staff tomorrow and talk through those things. I've made the decision already, but I don't want to say anything until I have a chance to speak with the staff.

Q. How has the team accepted the news and how excited are the players in getting prepared for this bowl game?

BRENT KEY: We probably found out 50 minutes before this. Not long.

I haven't been around the team yet. I've had a lot of them sending the texts across as soon as we found out. This is the bowl that we definitely are excited about. I haven't had a chance to be around all the players and get their reaction. From the text messages, our team seems extremely excited to come to Orlando and spend the holidays there.

Q. You've obviously had a couple of guys take other jobs elsewhere, and I think that's something you've done well is putting together a good staff. I know I've heard you say, for instance, slow to hire, quick to fire. I wanted to ask you, when you go through your hires, what are the most important things that you prioritize to make the proper hire? For instance, I'm sure it's not just people that you know or people that are friends. But yeah, what do you prioritize?

BRENT KEY: So obviously a ton of names come through when you start to do these things. You have your own list. People surprise you. It's been a great opportunity here the last couple of days of really seeing what place Georgia Tech is as compared to three years ago and the quality of people that are interested, that have reached out, that want the job. It's very humbling to see that part of it.

But the number one quality, though, is fit. They've got to fit in with the staff and the team. They have to be somebody that the team is going to respond to, that the team is going to listen to, respond to, play for. There's got to be a high level of trust there.

Not everybody you've worked with before, but the vetting out of these guys, it's a very time-consuming process. But trust is such a huge thing with me.

Then we have an identity as a team that I want the hire to make sure that it fits into that identity. Look, that doesn't mean line up and do certain things a certain way. I want new ideas. I want new, fresh thoughts. I want to be able to put the players in a position to be able to have success on every play.

I'm going to take my time on this. I think my list is about 36 right now, people that have intrigued me. The thing about this, too, you go through this process, and a lot of times when you talk to people, it might not be the right time now, but it might be a name for the future or a relationship that you're able to build.

So I really enjoy this opportunity. I think it's a great time to find out about people and people find out about you and your program.

At the same time, this is a very important hire for us. I'm going to make sure that we exhaust every possibility and every option to make sure we get it right.

Q. Just talk about the chance to play in this game. You talked about how big of a deal it is, a chance to play BYU, a ranked team, a chance to get ten wins for the first time in a while, a chance for the seniors to finish strong. How special an opportunity is it for you guys, and how are you guys approaching it?

BRENT KEY: Yeah, we'll start approaching it tomorrow. We know who the opponent is. I know that the QCs, the GAs, they're already starting to break stuff down, break film down and get rolling on that.

This is a huge, huge game for us. Bowl games are meant to be a reward for the players and the team and the staff, the coaches. But at the same time, we have one mission, and that's to go to Orlando to win a football game, bottom line.

We're going to have fun. We're going to enjoy it. We're going to enjoy everything that Orlando has to offer and the Pop-Tarts Bowl has to offer us. It's going to be an outstanding time there, but the excitement comes with the reward within this game.

The chance to get 10 wins, the chance to send the seniors off who have done so much for this program over the last several years that they've been here -- and then it keeps the positive momentum going into the offseason.

Q. I was just curious what kind of the senior class's feel is on this. You have 27 seniors, I think it is, and how important this game is for those guys to play their final game at Georgia Tech?

BRENT KEY: Yeah, again, I have not been around the players since we found out, but I know going into this over the last few days when we were together, they were super excited to find out who we were playing, where we were playing, because they are all locked in and ready to go compete and play one last game together as the 2025 version of the Georgia Tech football team.

Q. To that point, talking about what this game means, we're in an era now where some players opt out of bowl games. We've seen a team already in Notre Dame say they're not going to compete in a bowl game. For you guys, for where we're at in the modern era of college football, what does it mean to have your guys committed to a bowl game like this, even though it's outside a College Football Playoff?

BRENT KEY: Yeah, an opportunity to compete is all the competitors can ask for, right? You want to surround yourself with competitive people in life -- not just on a football team, but in life. That's what I look for in recruiting. That's what I look for in the development of guys.

We want to develop or recruit and develop competitive people, because they're the ones that are going to be successful in life later on when they truly want to compete at everything they do.

I can't control people's thoughts and processes and what they want to do. I can just provide information, provide the structure. That stuff all takes care of itself because of the locker room and the culture of the team.

I know from talking to guys already, if you brought it up to a player, one of our guys, they would laugh at you. Again, I can't control what people are going to do, but regardless, we're going to have 11 people on each side of the football and go out there and compete.

But one of the four pillars of our program is commitment. When you commit to something, you commit for the full time. That's my belief. That's the way I feel, and that's the way I am.

Q. Real quick, when you were talking about making an announcement about the play caller, is that just for who is going to do it during the Pop-Tarts Bowl, or do you already know who is going to be the next OC for you?

BRENT KEY: No, I know. Like I said, I've whittled my list down. I'm down to 36 people right now that I'm vetting through and talking with. I'm going to take the time to get this thing right.

If it takes two days or it takes two months, it doesn't really matter to me. This is about the players and getting the right fit to be able to coach our players into a championship football team.