Photo by: Anna Fuder/Utah Athletics
11/2/2026 3:10 PM | Football
SALT LAKE CITY – University of Utah head football coach Morgan Scalley held his weekly press conference on Monday with members of the media inside the Spence and Cleone Eccles Football Center.
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Selected quotes from Coach Scalley can be seen below. Click here for the full press conference video.
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Opening Statement…
"First off, I was made aware of the young man in Cincinnati in the stands and the medical situation there, was made aware of that after the game, didn't know quite much. I'm hearing that he's in stable condition, but our thoughts are with everyone involved there. Our time in Cincinnati was awesome. Fans were very accepting and Coach Satterfield and that crew do a heck of a job, very good team, so we're hoping for the best in that situation, but they were a great host to us on that trip. State of the U, congrats to Erin Vringer, cross country. She was named All-Big 12 for her performance at the Big 12 Championships this past weekend. The Utes finished fifth in the team standings. Erin, congrats. Happy basketball season. It starts tonight. Let's go. The Utes, coach Jensen and the crew taking on Long Beach State tonight. Pack the Huntsman Center for the Utes. Coach Petersen and the women will open up tomorrow night at the Huntsman Center against Eastern Washington. Good luck to everyone involved. Volleyball heads out on the road for a swing through the Arizona schools and then, I mean, a lot's happening on campus this week outside of the basketball that's going on. Soccer has their final game of the season Thursday night. It'd be great for Ute fans to show up and support there. Swim and Dive have home meets as well on Thursday and Friday and it's a great time of year. Everyone's competing, everyone's doing good things. In terms of the Utes at Cincinnati, really pleased with the way our guys started. Very focused, concentrated work throughout the week. I thought, in particular, Devon made some really good decision-making. Different guys stepped up. Daniel Bray had another solid performance. I thought Hunter Andrews, as much as he's done in blocking and team football, for him to get a standout performance was fantastic. The offensive line play in general was really good. Defensive side of the ball, [Elijah] Davis, I believe it's been announced, the Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week. I thought he had his best game, tackling and you watch him in pursuit, as well as obviously the pick-six, so a really good game by him. Rabbit Evans and Ethan Day also with a solid performances. Orion Phillips, two huge punts, one almost hitting inside the 10 but also one that inside our own 20 and you flip the field and they start near their 20, so fantastic punt by Orion flipping the field and special teams. There's some things special team-wise I don't think we're doing a good enough job in the kickoff return, have to clean some things up there, but overall pleased with the performance. The second half, run fits, not good enough. Second half turnovers, giving the ball away, not good enough, but to go into that stadium against a team that just knocked off a top 10 team and to play the way we did, I was very pleased. By way of announcement on the injury front, Kelvin Obot is out for the season, lower leg. He'll be done for the year and then we've got BYU coming up. Huge matchup. I believe this is the first time we've both been in the top 10 going up against each other. That's awesome. Awesome for the state. Big rivalry game. Kalani, respect the heck out of him and that staff. I have a lot of guys that I know over there that even coached with or just have known for a long time. Respect them and what they do, very good on both sides of the ball really and expect nothing but the best from them. Defensive side of the ball, various fronts. They run the ball, they're active, they have really good technique up front, secondary is very solid in coverage. On the offensive side of the ball, obviously Bear [Bachmeier], it all runs through him. We expect LJ [Martin] probably to be back. We don't know, but we're planning for it and it's going to be a heck of a matchup. Early, 10 a.m., but I know our fans are juiced and fired up and they'll be there early, and excited for this one. We expect a huge crowd and a huge viewing audience as well. This is a big one. It's not the big one, it's a big one, just like last week was a big one. There's only the big one. I keep hearing people say this is the big one, nope. The big one, only two teams playing, so it is a big one. We're excited for it."
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On what stood out about Kalani Sitake when they worked together and what their relationships is like now…
"Kalani, the ultimate competitor. He and I are very alike in the sense that we love to have fun, we love to joke, but when it gets down to it and competing, and you cross those lines, it's, OK, it's time to win. Respect him so much as a human for the good that he does, the good that he is. Myself, Kalani, and Bronco Mendenhall had dinner before the season started, respect each other. Kalani's a dear friend, so I love him, and I'm grateful for what he taught me and excited to go against him."
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On if he has a favorite rivalry moment…
"As a player, it's hard to beat the, because we'd never done anything like it, when we beat BYU to be able to go to the Fiesta Bowl. You lose that game, all of a sudden, your dreams are dashed and so, that, the fans rushing the field, throwing Tostitos chips up in the air and my helmet was stolen. No idea where it is, but we were able to get another one. It's not like it is today, with everyone having five helmets. That was my one helmet. The 3-0 game down in Provo. That was neat because it was our first outright conference championship in 50 years that we'd won. It was the coldest game I've ever experienced, either as a player or as a coach. It took everyone that was driving back to Salt Lake City two hours to get home because everyone was sliding off the road. I had torn my meniscus the week prior against Wyoming, had surgery on Monday and then played Saturday. That's how much the rivalry, it means a lot. That was neat. And then I think they had the longest scoring streak in the NCAA at that point, and then we were able to hold them 0."
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On if he has a message for the team in the midst of all the attention they're receiving…
"Our guys are very aware that nothing is given to you and to say we're owed anything, owed a ranking, owed this, owed that. No, no one owes you anything. You go earn it every single day. Every game matters and when you say, OK, this one, it really doesn't matter. How do you know? At the end of the season, that one loss could have ruined your entire chance. We had two losses last year. Who would have thought, OK, well, had you got one of those, you would've been playing in the Big 12 Championship. Every game matters and no one owes you anything. You go earn it every single day and the minute you stop being hungry is the minute someone that's hungrier than you comes in and takes what you have. That's not something that we sit here and we pat ourselves on the back every day about what our ranking is. The only ranking that matters is at the end of the season. That's it. Control what we can control. The other thing is the film is going to show you. If we can't look at that film and say we've got stuff to correct, we're blind. Poor run fits in the second half, Not good enough special teams. There's stuff on that film that's like, OK, we let them come back. We let them score points. We turned the ball over. We can't turn the ball over. That's stuff that loses you football games. We're very aware of what we need to do to improve and we have great leadership that understands we're here in this spot because we have focused each week on that moment. I'm pretty confident in our guys that they're not going to look beyond this week."
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On what it's like having Devon Dampier lead his team into this week's game…
"Awesome. Because I've gone into a game without a quarterback. I understand from a defensive coordinator perspective, it's so nice to be able to not only see, because this is a guy that's making really good decisions throwing the ball and he's also making people pay and running the ball when he can run it. He does not shy away from calling [quarterback] game. He's tough. He's competitive. He'll call his own number. I'll go to war any day with a guy like that. I'm very, very pleased with Devon, his progress, and also his leadership and how he's led throughout the season."
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Selected quotes from Coach Scalley can be seen below. Click here for the full press conference video.
Â
Opening Statement…
"First off, I was made aware of the young man in Cincinnati in the stands and the medical situation there, was made aware of that after the game, didn't know quite much. I'm hearing that he's in stable condition, but our thoughts are with everyone involved there. Our time in Cincinnati was awesome. Fans were very accepting and Coach Satterfield and that crew do a heck of a job, very good team, so we're hoping for the best in that situation, but they were a great host to us on that trip. State of the U, congrats to Erin Vringer, cross country. She was named All-Big 12 for her performance at the Big 12 Championships this past weekend. The Utes finished fifth in the team standings. Erin, congrats. Happy basketball season. It starts tonight. Let's go. The Utes, coach Jensen and the crew taking on Long Beach State tonight. Pack the Huntsman Center for the Utes. Coach Petersen and the women will open up tomorrow night at the Huntsman Center against Eastern Washington. Good luck to everyone involved. Volleyball heads out on the road for a swing through the Arizona schools and then, I mean, a lot's happening on campus this week outside of the basketball that's going on. Soccer has their final game of the season Thursday night. It'd be great for Ute fans to show up and support there. Swim and Dive have home meets as well on Thursday and Friday and it's a great time of year. Everyone's competing, everyone's doing good things. In terms of the Utes at Cincinnati, really pleased with the way our guys started. Very focused, concentrated work throughout the week. I thought, in particular, Devon made some really good decision-making. Different guys stepped up. Daniel Bray had another solid performance. I thought Hunter Andrews, as much as he's done in blocking and team football, for him to get a standout performance was fantastic. The offensive line play in general was really good. Defensive side of the ball, [Elijah] Davis, I believe it's been announced, the Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week. I thought he had his best game, tackling and you watch him in pursuit, as well as obviously the pick-six, so a really good game by him. Rabbit Evans and Ethan Day also with a solid performances. Orion Phillips, two huge punts, one almost hitting inside the 10 but also one that inside our own 20 and you flip the field and they start near their 20, so fantastic punt by Orion flipping the field and special teams. There's some things special team-wise I don't think we're doing a good enough job in the kickoff return, have to clean some things up there, but overall pleased with the performance. The second half, run fits, not good enough. Second half turnovers, giving the ball away, not good enough, but to go into that stadium against a team that just knocked off a top 10 team and to play the way we did, I was very pleased. By way of announcement on the injury front, Kelvin Obot is out for the season, lower leg. He'll be done for the year and then we've got BYU coming up. Huge matchup. I believe this is the first time we've both been in the top 10 going up against each other. That's awesome. Awesome for the state. Big rivalry game. Kalani, respect the heck out of him and that staff. I have a lot of guys that I know over there that even coached with or just have known for a long time. Respect them and what they do, very good on both sides of the ball really and expect nothing but the best from them. Defensive side of the ball, various fronts. They run the ball, they're active, they have really good technique up front, secondary is very solid in coverage. On the offensive side of the ball, obviously Bear [Bachmeier], it all runs through him. We expect LJ [Martin] probably to be back. We don't know, but we're planning for it and it's going to be a heck of a matchup. Early, 10 a.m., but I know our fans are juiced and fired up and they'll be there early, and excited for this one. We expect a huge crowd and a huge viewing audience as well. This is a big one. It's not the big one, it's a big one, just like last week was a big one. There's only the big one. I keep hearing people say this is the big one, nope. The big one, only two teams playing, so it is a big one. We're excited for it."
Â
On what stood out about Kalani Sitake when they worked together and what their relationships is like now…
"Kalani, the ultimate competitor. He and I are very alike in the sense that we love to have fun, we love to joke, but when it gets down to it and competing, and you cross those lines, it's, OK, it's time to win. Respect him so much as a human for the good that he does, the good that he is. Myself, Kalani, and Bronco Mendenhall had dinner before the season started, respect each other. Kalani's a dear friend, so I love him, and I'm grateful for what he taught me and excited to go against him."
Â
On if he has a favorite rivalry moment…
"As a player, it's hard to beat the, because we'd never done anything like it, when we beat BYU to be able to go to the Fiesta Bowl. You lose that game, all of a sudden, your dreams are dashed and so, that, the fans rushing the field, throwing Tostitos chips up in the air and my helmet was stolen. No idea where it is, but we were able to get another one. It's not like it is today, with everyone having five helmets. That was my one helmet. The 3-0 game down in Provo. That was neat because it was our first outright conference championship in 50 years that we'd won. It was the coldest game I've ever experienced, either as a player or as a coach. It took everyone that was driving back to Salt Lake City two hours to get home because everyone was sliding off the road. I had torn my meniscus the week prior against Wyoming, had surgery on Monday and then played Saturday. That's how much the rivalry, it means a lot. That was neat. And then I think they had the longest scoring streak in the NCAA at that point, and then we were able to hold them 0."
Â
On if he has a message for the team in the midst of all the attention they're receiving…
"Our guys are very aware that nothing is given to you and to say we're owed anything, owed a ranking, owed this, owed that. No, no one owes you anything. You go earn it every single day. Every game matters and when you say, OK, this one, it really doesn't matter. How do you know? At the end of the season, that one loss could have ruined your entire chance. We had two losses last year. Who would have thought, OK, well, had you got one of those, you would've been playing in the Big 12 Championship. Every game matters and no one owes you anything. You go earn it every single day and the minute you stop being hungry is the minute someone that's hungrier than you comes in and takes what you have. That's not something that we sit here and we pat ourselves on the back every day about what our ranking is. The only ranking that matters is at the end of the season. That's it. Control what we can control. The other thing is the film is going to show you. If we can't look at that film and say we've got stuff to correct, we're blind. Poor run fits in the second half, Not good enough special teams. There's stuff on that film that's like, OK, we let them come back. We let them score points. We turned the ball over. We can't turn the ball over. That's stuff that loses you football games. We're very aware of what we need to do to improve and we have great leadership that understands we're here in this spot because we have focused each week on that moment. I'm pretty confident in our guys that they're not going to look beyond this week."
Â
On what it's like having Devon Dampier lead his team into this week's game…
"Awesome. Because I've gone into a game without a quarterback. I understand from a defensive coordinator perspective, it's so nice to be able to not only see, because this is a guy that's making really good decisions throwing the ball and he's also making people pay and running the ball when he can run it. He does not shy away from calling [quarterback] game. He's tough. He's competitive. He'll call his own number. I'll go to war any day with a guy like that. I'm very, very pleased with Devon, his progress, and also his leadership and how he's led throughout the season."
Players Mentioned
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