Here are some comments from the Big 12 Media Days in Frisco, Texas, earlier in July.

New Oklahoma football head coach Brent Venables brought quarterback Dillon Gabriel, wide receiver Marvin Mims, defensive end Ethan Downs, cornerback Woodi Washington and defensive back Justin Broyles to the media event.

Venables was asked who would be the team leaders for OU in this transition year, particularly since both of last year’s starting quarterbacks had transferred to other schools.

“I’ve got five of them with me here today,” Venables said. “So I won’t go through each and every one of them today, but I’ve been most excited about – I can go through a laundry list of more players, and it was kind of a struggle to figure out who’s earned the right, because I’m limited in the number of guys I can bring.

“It’s really been a team effort from a leadership standpoint. There’s been buy-in at every position on both sides of the ball. I would be remiss if I just named a few guys…

“And these guys here today represent a great locker room of a bunch of great leaders.”

Venables is all in on continuing OU’s rich tradition and that helped him decide to leave Clemson and rejoin the Sooners.

“I have 17 former players on my staff,” Venables said. “…I’ve been a very connected person my whole life, and it’s always about the people. The people always make the place, but Oklahoma is a special place, and so it was – when everything got right and I knew that I was going to be supported the way that I feel like I needed to be a successful head coach, it was a no-brainer. It was a slam dunk.”

Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy talked about his longevity in a profession that is famous for dumping coaches.

“I’ve been very fortunate to be around some great administrative support during my career,” Gundy said. “I’ve had just a number of young men obviously that have contributed a lot and given a lot to Oklahoma State University. We have great people. Stillwater is a great place to be. It’s a comfortable place to be.

“I’m in a situation now, and when we have a new administration that’s been aboard for a year, to have a new president, Dr. Shrum is fantastic. Chad Weiberg is the athletic director, and that makes it even more comfortable than ever. I’m extremely excited about our new (Big 12) commissioner and what he brings to the table.

“I think when you put all that together and you kind of understand who you are and what direction you need to go, it allows you to stay in one place a long time.”

Texas, like Oklahoma, has a lot of new players this year. Thirty-five of their 85 scholarship players are new, with seven transfers and 28 freshmen. Ten freshmen were at Texas for the spring semester.

“We signed seven offensive linemen, eight defensive linemen, so 15 linemen of the 35 guys that joined our team,” Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said as he approaches his second season.

Texas must choose among Hudson Card, Quinn Ewers and Maalik Murphy for a starting quarterback.

Who gets the nod?

“We’ll see” said Sarkisian. “Time will tell. But I’ve been really impressed with both these guys in Hudson and Quinn and the work that they’ve done to prepare themselves.

Last season, Baylor was picked to finish eighth in the Big 12 and won the title. This year, the Bears are the preseason No. 1 pick. The beat Mississippi in the Sugar Bowl last season.

Baylor Coach Dave Aranda wants to repeat.

“I think it starts with our brand-new team,” he said. “It starts with making everybody available, which is difficult to do. We were talking about that earlier. I think it just seems that – and I’m way included in this, just that people in general have a way of getting in their own way…

“I think for our staff, it’s been a challenge to incorporate and include and to forgive maybe things that have been looked at as disadvantages. Maybe it’s a player or it’s a skill set or it’s a building, it’s a meeting room, whatever it is. I think to include and say yes to it all is our secret sauce. And I think it’s difficult to do, and I think the challenge is to always be open minded and have your heart wide open for all of it.”

Aranda said returning depth on his offense and defensive lines will be a strength.

Due to conference realignments, Nebraska lost its annual rivalry with OU, Missouri lost the game with Kansas, Colorado doesn’t play Missouri, Texas hasn’t been playing Texas A&M and it looks like the annual game between OU and OSU could fall by the wayside.

Could the annual in-state rivalry between Iowa State and Iowa (in the Big Ten) be a victim of conference changes?

“I wish I had the power to answer that question other than the fact of I would just say for us, in our state, we’re really fortunate,” said ISU coach Matt Campbell. “There are no pro sports teams. To have two what are Power Five conferences right now programs playing and to be able to compete against one another, I think it’s really special for our entire state. I know that’s meant a lot to the state of Iowa, certainly means a lot to our alumni bases and our universities. So for us we’re really grateful that that’s continued and certainly has the opportunity to continue moving forward.”

Amazingly, Campbell is the second longest tenured head coach in the Big 12. Due to his recent success, his name has been tossed out for recent openings.

“Being in this conference from year one to now going into year seven, the one thing that I do think is really special top to bottom in this conference is consistency,” Campbell said. “There’s not an easy out on Saturday in the football conference. I think you’ve seen great coaches, great teams really consistently play week in and week out. I think that has made this conference really special. I think it makes every game that gets played in this conference really special.”

New TCU head coach Sonny Dykes has coached some pretty good quarterbacks and worked with some accomplished coaches.

He was Mike Leach’s graduate assistant at Kentucky and Hal Mumme was head coach. Tim Couch, the first pick in the NFL draft, was their quarterback. Then Dykes went to Texas Tech. At Arizona, he coached Nick Foles, who was a Super Bowl MVP. At California, Dykes coaches Jaren Goff, who also was the first pick in the draft.

At TCU, he has Chandler Morris, a transfer from OU, and Max Duggan.

“I know Chandler well, had a chance to watch him play at Highland Park High School when I was at SMU,” Dykes said. “When I talked to Lincoln Riley about Chandler, Lincoln had nothing but great things to say about him. Everybody that dealt with him at Oklahoma said the same thing, he’s just a great kid, hardworking, loves the game…

“We’re also very excited about Max Duggan. Had a chance to watch Max play up close and personal at TCU when I was at SMU, saw what he could do. A very tough, tough guy, very athletic, very physical. I think the players really respond and respect the way he plays the game.”

West Virginia coach Neal Brown is on the outskirts of the footprint for the Big 12 and is will get worse next season with the addition of BYU in particular.

Is it a big issue for the Mountaineers?

“It’s not for football,” Brown said. “I can only speak from a football perspective. The travel is not that big a deal. You’re going to do four games, four away games, and at least a couple trips to Texas each year. Some years you’re going to have five away games.

“But you’re talking about the difference between a two-hour flight and maybe a two-and-a-half-hour flight. We’re going to leave on Friday afternoon and get there Friday evening.

“The only thing that’s detrimental is sometimes if you play a night game on the road, in Lubbock or in Fort Worth, then you’re looking at a really early Sunday morning return. And so you’ve got to be careful how you handle that Sunday and Monday on the back end. Now, for Olympic sports, it’s a different story. But in football, it’s not as big an issue as maybe what it gets talked about.”

Texas Tech Coach Joey McGuire thinks his football program gets a big boost from the success of the Red Raider basketball team.

It helps recruiting, too. For a while this spring, Texas Tech had the top rated 2023 football recruiting class in the nation.

“Have you ever been to a game in West Texas? McGuire asked. ”Of course, that was after football, so we go 18-0 in basketball, and we’re bringing in Junior Days, and it’s Mississippi State and we’re playing in front of 15,000 people. It’s really easy to see and show recruits: This is who we are and this is our fan base.

“My daughter is a Red Raider, and I thought I knew what the alumni and the fans – I felt their passion. I thought I did until I became the head coach, and I’ve never seen anything like it. The love for that university is absolutely incredible, and we’re using it like crazy whenever it comes to recruiting.

“Then whenever you talk about a brand-new facility, I think it’s going to be the best in the country. It’s going to be very unique. It’s going to tie four fields together that you can just walk across a sky bridge and be in the indoor or be on the game field.

“It’s a really big deal for us, and I think it’s a game changer.”

Kansas State coach Chris Klieman’s team led in selections on the preseason Big 12 football team.

“One, guys did some really good things last year that garnered that recognition,” Klieman said.  I look at it and applaud our staff, coaches, support staff, recruiting staff for continuing to set the standard in recruiting and continue to recruit quality student-athletes here and developing them.

“And then take that development stage, whether it’s Scott Trausch in nutrition to Tru Carroll in strength and conditioning to Mindy Hoffman in athletic training, so many people are going to have an impact on your career, and taking all those people seriously and learning from all those people so that you can become the best version of yourself.

{And to have six guys that are receiving accolades is pretty neat. I think of the handful; that I would have said, boy, that one would have deserved it, as well. So I’m excited because I think every team probably has those unheralded four or five guys that you think, well, that kid is going to really surprise some people because of how talented they are. But I was excited for those six guys.

“I didn’t pay attention to who was first, who was second as far as leading the conference, just the fact that those guys got the recognition they deserved.”

Kansas coach Lance Leipold knows his team has beaten Texas twice in the past six years.

“…We’ve been starving for some wins, so any of them we’re going to talk about,” Leipold said. “When you beat a program with the tradition and past success of the University of Texas and resources, all in all it’s something that we’re going to be proud of.

“I’ve said this, as well; to go down there at 1-8 and where we’ve been is probably one of the things I’m most proud of, is that the preparation and the things that our guys kind of still were doing what we were asking, especially in year one, especially the timing that we came.

“There’s a lot of times unfortunately in college football where guys can go through the motions, and this team didn’t do that. And I’m extremely proud of them and our staff for that and the fact that we went down to Fort Worth and played with some great effort there.

“It made it easier to walk in some Texas high schools, to be quite honest, that there may be that chance that maybe we didn’t get on young men before.

“Now we have to build upon it, but it’s definitely something positive. But I know that Coach Sarkisian and that program is going to be – we probably hit them at a time when they were in a struggle and were able to take advantage of it, but we know obviously this is a new year, new challenges.”