On Monday, head coach Joey McGuire spoke to the media for his weekly press conference ahead of this weekend’s matchup against #22 Texas.

McGuire opened with the injury report and broke the news that Weston Wright would be returning.

“Guys this week that won’t be playing are Adrian Frye, he’s got a mixture of things,” McGuire said. “Cam’ron (Valdez) is really, really close; we’re expecting him back next week. Derrick Lewis, again, really, really close. Questionable this week is Dimitri Moore and the guy we’re excited to get back this week is Weston Wright.”

McGuire also gave an update on Bryce Ramirez who suffered the leg fracture on Saturday.

“He just got out of his second surgery,” McGuire said. “Hopefully it’ll be Wednesday or Thursday when he’s back home in Lubbock.”

McGuire also gave an update on Tyler Shough and an updated timeline for the opening night quarterback.

“I still think the earliest is Oklahoma State and then the bye and then West Virginia, one of those two,” McGuire said. “Of course, he won’t play this week, but I don’t see him playing against K-State.”

McGuire continued speaking on Shough, confirming that there was a surgical procedure done to the quarterback.

“He ended up with a plate in his shoulder to stabilize it,” McGuire said. “It wasn’t what it was last year and that’s why they decided to do it.”

McGuire spoke about the challenges of Steve Sarkisian and the respect he has for Texas’ head coach.

“I don’t know Steve really well, but I’ve got to know him through media days and different things like that,” McGuire said. “I’m really excited to play against him and he’s one of the best play callers in the nation.”

McGuire spoke highly about both Texas quarterbacks in Hudson Card and Quinn Ewers and spoke about his gameplan for whichever quarterback the Longhorns play.

“I guess Quinn had more stars or a higher rating, but I think they’re talking about four and five-star quarterbacks out of Lake Travis and Southlake Carroll, I mean they’re groomed to be quarterbacks,” McGuire said. “Hudson’s going to be ready to go and they’re going to run the same offense.”

McGuire spoke about the Texas offense as a whole and the threat that Bijan Robinson poises to the defense.

“The two running backs are special, they’re guys that really make that team go and are physical,” McGuire said. “Something that we’re going to have to do a good job of is tackling this week. They have two really good receivers; I have a little bit of history with Whittington and the young receiver is an All-American from last year. They definitely have the skill to make that offense a challenge for us.

McGuire spoke about his philosophy on kickoff return, something that the Red Raiders have struggled with to this point this season.

“If it’s two or three yards in the end zone, we want to let it go,” McGuire said. “If not, we want to bring it out. Our philosophy is that we want to be aggressive.”

McGuire shed some light on his clock management late in the NC State game, addressing the question of when he called the timeouts down the stretch.

“If it doesn’t help you get a full 40 seconds, you should not call a timeout,” McGuire said. Older school thinking would be to take a timeout on third down.”

McGuire continued on his philosophy, saying that he leans more into analytics over the last few years than he has in the past.

“I’m old, I’ve done it a long time and I’ve always gone by my gut,” McGuire said. “I saw the benefits of what Dave Aranda has done and now we meet every Thursday with Rob Ashu, he’s been doing it for 37 years and he’s the champion in analytics.”

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