Tulane Relishes the Gritty, Tough Moniker Given It

Tulane head coach Jon Sumrall has described his 2025 version of this Green Wave football team as "gritty and tough." He went as far as saying, "We're not pretty. Yet." That might offend some. Not this team.

"We still have that fight in us," Tulane wide receiver Bryce Bohannon said this week when looking back at the Green Wave come-from-behind wins against South Alabama and Army, and even the loss to Ole Miss in Oxford. "I think those games and that Ole Miss game helped us not want to have that feeling again."

When we asked Bohannon what makes them, as Sumrall described them, gritty and tough, he didn't even hesitate.

"Rusty Whitt," he said mentioning the Tulane strength and conditioning coach. "He makes us have to be gritty. There's no practice, no training session that we go through where it's not going to be gritty. That training (from Whitt) just came out (in those plays that matter)."

Tulane defensive coordinator Greg Gasparato agreed.

"We've got some grit," coach Gasparato said, "and that starts with Rusty Whitt. Every workout, every message he delivers, it just kind of permeates through the staff and the players, and they believe. No matter how hard it's going to be, we're going to find a way to win. We've put them in some really hard situations in the offseason, and they've seen themselves overcome that."

But Gasparato also pointed to back to that six-letter word, belief.

"When you have a little bit of belief, man that can go a long way," Gasparato pointed out, referring to the touchdown catch by Bohannon with under two minutes left to tie the game. "If we don't make that play, I don't know how it's going to finish up. When Bryce came down with that ball, it was a shot of adrenaline to everybody. We said, 'We're going to win this game.' We've done it over and over."

"We all knew we needed to make a play at the end of the game," Bohannon said. "(Quarterback) Jake (Retzlaff) trusted me to make the play."

And Bohannon was quick to point out the defensive stop by the Wave defense as one more example of his team's grittiness.

"It's hard to stop an Army team," Bohannon said. "You get three-and-outs (on the Army offense), we count that as turnovers for us. Seeing them (the Tulane defense) make those turnovers, gives a spark."

Tulane has a shorten bye week before heading to San Antonio on Thursday, October 30 to take on UTSA.