BIG 12 CHAMPIONSHIP GAME: TEXAS v COLORADO

December 3, 2005

Gary Barnett

Joe Klopfenstein

THE MODERATOR: Joel is going to be okay. You want to make a couple opening comments.

GARY BARNETT: Joel said it all. They're a great team. We played awful. You get what you got. Good luck to them.

THE MODERATOR: We'll take questions from the floor.

GARY BARNETT: They felt at the time they were huge. Who knows how the game would have unfolded if we had gone on? We knew Texas was going to beat us probably, but we were going to be able to get some points on the board. Turnovers and penalties killed us. We continued to do that today. It certainly hurt our chances in this game.

GARY BARNETT: Well, the loss at Iowa State, we've never gotten over it. I can't for the life of me figure out why. We all know this is a pretty fragile existence, and I think we knew all along that it's always fragile, you know, I think that what happened to us is an example of it. We're more of a fragile team than I thought. I knew the possibility was there. For some reason, we have not overcome that loss to Iowa State. The way it happened, and we were so stunned with it, and this is pure speculation, but that's what it feels like.

GARY BARNETT: You know, he just takes over a game, like he did in the Rose Bowl. I have communicated several times that, watching him in the Rose Bowl last year, seeing him take over a game in that environment against a team like Michigan, what you saw was the coming up of a great player. It seemed like -- I think Mack has said in the Missouri game last year, but I know what he did in the Rose Bowl is phenomenal, and he hasn't slowed down since then, unfortunately for us, and fortunately for them. You saw it, we had everybody covered and he takes off on ten yards and scores. You don't have an answer or a solution for it, or we sure didn't.

GARY BARNETT: You know, that's a hard question for me right now. If you don't mind, I would just as soon go to another one.

GARY BARNETT: It wasn't a very good one. I believe my message at half time was one team had played a championship half, and now we need to go play our championship the second half. We weren't going two minute. We were going to go out and try to execute our game plan and play better and see what happens. Maybe we can create some breaks. We really wanted to come and earn our respect back in the second half. It went the other way pretty fast.

JOE KLOPFENSTEIN: It's just like he said, since the Iowa State game there's something mentally wrong with our team. We thought we found out what it was a few times, but we've come to find it's not it. We get into the games and we get down, and there's something wrong with our team where we can't fight through that. We have to figure out a way to correct that.

GARY BARNETT: The short-term plan is we'll take the next ten days off. We have finals that start next Friday. We'll probably do a little 7-on-7 and probably won't resume practice until the 15th, providing there's a bowl.

GARY BARNETT: I think in our locker room, we made a commitment to fix whatever it is for the bowl game, and of course we felt like we could get it ready for this game. You shouldn't be coaching or playing this game if you don't believe that, and we did, and I believed it until, you know, the third quarter unraveled on us. Of course, you do.

GARY BARNETT: I don't have one so that's all speculation. I would have to think about it real heavily, but he would sure be in contention. He's one of the two guys I would vote for. He's awful good. If they gave me two ballots I would vote twice for him, but if I had to make a decision I would vote for him.

THE MODERATOR: Any other questions for the coach? Coach, congratulations for a great season and good luck.

End of FastScripts